•«'•  :"    :»y 

REESE   LIBRARY 


UNIVERSITY  OF.  CALIFORNIA. 

MAR  13   1893        •  l89    • 
Accessions  No.  *>~a  14.14 '  -      Class  No... 


WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 


OK 


OUE  TAEIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES 


BY 


N.   H.   CHAMBERLAIN 


OP  THE 

UBIVBRSITT 


BOSTON 
DE  WOLFE,   FISKE  &  CO. 

361  AND  365  WASHINGTON  STREET 


COPYRIGHT,  1890, 
By  DE  WOLFE,  FISKE  &  Co. 


C.  J.  PETERS  &  SON, 

TYPOGRAPHERS  AND  ELECTROTYPERS, 

145  HIGH  STREET,   BOSTON. 


PREFACE. 


THIS  book  owes  thanks  to  brave  Congressmen 
like  Messrs.  Cox,  Carlisle,  Mills,  Breckenridge  and 
Russell,  who  have  spoken  honest  words  in  the  ears 
of  their  countrymen  against  the  protection  fallacy  ; 
to  honest  scholars  in  Political  Economy  who  have 
disproved  many  times  that  fallacy ;  especially  to 
Honorable  D.  A.  Wells,  for  the  learning  and  re- 
search which  have  arrayed  in  his  pages,  by  proven 
facts,  modern  civilization  and  progress  against  the 
now  discredited  barbarism  of  all  protection  tariffs, 
notably  our  own.  It  owes  especial  thanks  to  Mr. 
Charles  F.  Chamberlayne  of  the  Boston  bar,  for 

valued  advice  and  cooperation. 

THE  AUTHOR. 
MONUMENT  BEACH,  MASS.,  March,  1890. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I.  PAGE 

THE  GROCERY  STORE  —  "  HURRAH  FOR  OUR  SIDE  "  —  THE 
"  LOCKOUT  "  —  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER —  "SQUIRE  "  FREE- 
MAN —  "  GENERAL  IGNORANCE  "  — PENNSYLVANIA  vs. 
NOVA  SCOTIA—  "  HEN  "  FARMER  —  "  PROTECTION  "  11 

CHAPTER  II. 

THE  FOUNDRY  MEETING— WHAT  is  THE  TARIFF?  — "A 
BLAMED  SECESSIONER" — INDIRECT  TAXATION  —  POLL 
TAX  NOT  THE  ONLY  TAX  —  HISTORY  OF  AMERICAN  TAR- 
IFFS —  IRISH  INDUSTRIES  —  HENRY  CLAY  DOCTRINE  — 
INFANT  INDUSTRIES  —  PRESENT  DOCTRINE  OF  PROTEC- 
TION —  WHO  PAYS  TAXES  —  TAX  REDUCTION  — ' '  OLD 
CLEVELAND"— A  ROLL  OF  HONOR 22 

CHAPTER  III. 

A  NEWSPAPER  ORGAN  —  COUNTRY  OR  PARTY  —  THE  CON- 
SUMER PAY'S  THE  TARIFF  TAX  —  "FREE  TRADE"  DE- 
FINED —  OUR  PRODUCTION  —  THE  TRUSTS  HAVE  COME  .  46 

CHAPTER  IV. 

"  PROTECTION  "  AND  THE  "  HOME  MARKET  "  —  THE  PEO- 
PLE SAVE  THE  COUNTRY  —  THE  ECLIPSE  —  WHAT  MAKES 
THIS  COUNTRY  GREAT  —  THE  TESTIMONY  OF  THE  MANU- 
FACTURERS—  WHEAT  AND  WOOL  —  "MARY  HAD  A  LIT- 
TLE LAMB  "—HATS  AND  CAPS— READY-MADE  CLOTHING  61 


8  CONTENTS, 

CHAPTER  V.  PAGE 

COST  OF  IRON   GOODS  —  SPECIMEN  TRICKS  —  DISCRIMINA- 
TION AGAINST  THE  POOR —  "PROTECTION  OR  ROBBERY  " 

—  THE  TOPEKA  CASE  —  WE  CONQUER  NATURE  BY 
OBEYING  HER  —  PROTECTION  UN-AMERICAN  —  PROTEC- 
TION CRUEL  —  TAXING  A  CORPSE  —  WE  ALL  WANT 
PROTECTION  —  FALSE  METAPHORS  —  THE  WOOLLEN 
MILL  AFIRE  81 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  WOOLLEN  MILL  —  Is  DESTRUCTION  A  BLESSING  TO 
LABOR  — GOOD  WORK  AND  BAD  WORK— THE  GASMEN'S 
PETITION  —  TAXES  ON  BUILDING  — LUMBER-FACTORIES 
AND  MACHINERY  —  Low  PRICES 96 


CHAPTER  VII. 

WAGES  AND  THE  TARIFF — DEMAND  AND  SUPPLY  —  THE 
AMERICAN  LABORER  is  THE  CHEAPEST  IN  THE  WORLD  — 
EXPORTS  OF  GOODS  WITH  LARGE  LABOR  COST  —  THE 
ANACONDA  GAME  —  FREE  TRADE  IN  LABOR  —  EN- 
HANCED PRICES  ON  NECESSARIES  —  FARMER'S  MORT-  112 

GAGE 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

FREE  TRADE  A  BLESSING  —  MONOPOLY  NEVER  YIELDS 
TILL  BEATEN  — MAKE  HASTE  SLOWLY  — THE  MILLS 
BILL  — THE  THREE  CLASSES  OF  PROTECTIONISTS  —  THE 
BASIS  OF  FREE  TRADE 132 


CHAPTER  IX. 

AUTHORITIES  FOR  THE  PLAINTIFF  IN  FREE  TRADE  vs. 
PROTECTION  —  THE  TEACHERS  OF  POLITICAL  ECONOMY 
—HISTORY  —  BELGIUM — HOLLAND  —  NEW  SOUTH  WALES 
AND  VICTORIA  —  ENGLAND  —  MR.  GLADSTONE  AT  LEEDS 
—  CONTINENTAL  EUROPE— THE  RECKONING  DAY  .  .  .  143 


CONTENTS.  9 

CHAPTEK   X.  PAGE 

SUGAK  AND  SHIPS  —  THE  SEEN  AND  THE  UNSEEN — BEET- 
ROOT SUGAR — RUSSIA  —  GERMANY  —  ENGLAND'S  PRES- 
ENT —  THE  "  JAM  TRADE"  —  UNITED  STATES  IN  SUGAR- 
RAISING  —  THE  SUGAR  TAX  —  THE  SUGAR  CON FE HENCE 
—  BOUNTIES  ON  SHIPS  —  UNITED  STATES  COMMERCE  — 
THE  PROTECTIONISTS'  REASONS— ALABAMA — IRON  SHIPS 
—  "  PAUPER  LABOR  "  —  THE  REMEDY  —  WAGONS  AND 
LOADS  —  "  I  LOVE  SHIPS  AND  AM  NOT  ASHAMED  OF  IT  "  165 


CHAPTER  XL 

FARMERS  AND  RAILROADS  —  THE  FARMER  GETS  NO  BENE- 
FIT FROM  THE  TARIFF  —  TAXED  AT  HOME  AND  STINTED 
ABROAD  —  THE  LUMBER  TAX  AND  THE  FARMER'  s  BUILD- 
INGS—EUROPEAN RETALIATION  —  RAILROADS  VICTIMS 
OF  PROTECTION— RAILROADS  THE  FARMER'S  FRIEND  — 
THE  FARMER  AND  THE  RYOT 187 


CHAPTER  XII. 

SOCIETY  AND  LABOR —  THE  DEACON'S  QUESTION — LABOR 
MUST  MIND  ITS  POLITICAL  DUTIES  —  POLITICS  AND  THE 
TARIFF  —  THE  REPUBLICAN  DILEMMA  —  EFFECTS  OF 
A  TARIFF  FOR*  .REVENUE  ONLY —  "  INUNDATION  "  — 
SECTIONALISM  AND  THE  TARIFF  —  SOCIALISM  AND  THE 
TARIFF  —  MORAL  ASPECT  OF  THE  SUBJECT  ...  ,  203 


NOTES 223 


UlTIVBRSXTT 


WHAT'S   THE   MATTER? 


CHAPTER  L 

"  WELL,  what's  the  matter  now  ?  " 

The  man  who  lifted  up  his  voice  to  ask  this  ques- 
tion was  a  common  looking  mechanic  of  Rabham,  a 
country  village  in  New  England,  by  the  sea;  and 
the  reason  of  his  rather  abrupt  inquiry  was  the 
thundering  noise  of  a  couple  of  drums  which  served 
as  the  bass  to  certain  intermittent  but  energetic 
cheers,  with  a  tendency  to  the  treble.  Rabham  itself 
was  a  little  busy  Yankee  town,  and  the  exact  local- 
ity of  this  question  was  the  village  grocery  store, 
with  its  long  rows  of  canned  fruits  and  patent  medi- 
cines looming  out  of  darkness  made  visible  by 
stray  kerosene  lamps  hung  to  the  store  posts,  and 
with  plenty  of  sugar-barrels  and  shoe-boxes,  where 
the  men  folk,  in  the  evening  when  work  was  over, 
could  disport  themselves  over  their  pipes  or  vile 
cigars,  coming  from  some  spot  on  earth  where  they 
never  have  a  good  one,  and  gossip  about  work,  poli- 
tics, and,  sometimes,  their  neighbors.  So  at  the 
question  there  was  a  sort  of  rustle,  as  if  several 
were  trying  to  shift  from  the  hard  side  of  their 


12  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

boards  to  the  soft  one,  and  there  was  another  answer- 
ing voice  from  somewhere  out  of  the  tobacco 
smoke, — 

"  Oh,  that's  the  Republicans  celebrating  Harri- 
son's election." 

This  information  projected  the  company  into  a 
very  animated  and  jubilant  outburst  of  patriotism, 
and  they  harangued  as  they  voted,  for  most  of  them 
happened  to  be  Republicans. 

"Didn't  we  give  it  to 'em  this  time  ?"  "Didn't 
we  tie  their  apron  strings  for  them?"  "Hurrah 
for  our  side  ! "  were  a  very  few  of  the  encomiums 
which  the  company  passed  on  their  party  and  its 
success.  One  of  the  more  godly  sort  ventured  to 
give  his  opinion  that  Harrison's  election  was  God's 
way  of  saving  the  nation  from  the  Irish,  and  that 
Bible  to  the  public  schools  which  so  many  very 
seldom  read  in  private. 

The  above  conversation,  if  it  could  be  called  such 
where  everybody  was  talking  at  the  same  moment, 
was  now  interrupted  by  the  procession  itself :  the 
usual  band  and  torchlights  ahead ;  young  men  to 
show  how  proud  they  were  of  their  victory  and  how 
much  they  had  contributed  to  the  same;  the  usual 
medley  of  boys  on  both  sidewalks,  hustling  eveiy- 
body  on  their  way  to  the  hall,  where  there  were  said 
to  be  crackers  and  cheese  for  the  victors ;  a  proces- 
sion as  brilliant  and  significant  as  every  one  like  it, 
where  the  local  candidate  for  the  legislature  pays 
the  bills.  In  due  time  the  store  came  back  to  its 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  13 

pipes  and  shoe-boxes.  Stragglers  from  the  hall 
where  the  torchlights  were  on  their  last  legs,  and 
the  bread  and  cheese  too,  came  in,  and  among  them, 
Pat  Maloney. 

"  By  jabers,  boys,"  said  he,  walking  into  the 
tobacco  smoke,  and  taking  to  a  shoe-box  with  the 
rest.  "There's  a  big  lockout  at  the  foundry." 

"  Lockout,  what !  "  cried  several. 

"Sure  as  blazes,  boys;  just  when  the  procession 
was  passin'  I  takes  a  squint  at  the  big  foundry  door, 
and  there  I  seen  it  writ,  as  clear  as  sunshine  with  a 
hole  through  it,  on  a  bit  o'  paper,  that  the  ould 
foundry's  shut  afther  Sathurday  next,  till  further 
notice.  Divil  a  bit  less,  but  I'm  shure  them's  the 
very  words." 

Silence  fell  on  the  crowd  in  the  tobacco  smoke. 
Most  of  them  were  foundry-men  and  had  families. 
Their  bread  and  butter  were  at  stake.  They  were 
out  of  work,  and  no  work  meant  no  bread  or  worse. 
The  storekeeper  pricked  up  his  ears  to  listen,  for  the 
workmen  bought  of  him,  and  could  they  pay  if 
out  of  work  all  winter,  to  say  nothing  of  the  old 
scores  ?  There  seemed  to  be  eager  conversation 
going  on  in  an  undertone  among  the  men,  as  if  in 
consultation,  until  at  last  one  of  the  elders  on  the 
edge  of  the  smoke  cloud  pat  a  plain  question  to  a 
man  in  a  slouched  hat  and  top  boots,  who  sat  there 
on  a  sugar-barrel,  a  trifle  apart  from  the  others, 
smoking  like  the  rest. 

"  What  does  all  thi$  mean,  squire  ?  What's  the 
matter?" 


14  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

The  man  addressed  as  "  squire  "  was  Horace  Free- 
man :  —  who  needs  but  a  few  words  to  introduce  him. 
He  had  been  born  here,  and  his  family  for  genera- 
tions had  been  in  the  iron  business,  in  which  they 
had  made  their  fortune.  He  himself  had  been  lib- 
erally educated  and  intended  for  the  law  ;  but  after 
a  few  busy  years  in  the  metropolis,  at  his  father's 
death  he  had  come  back  to  his  native  town  and 
taken  on  him  the  trust  care  of  several  large  estates. 
It  was  not  his  chief  characteristic  that  he  was  rich, 
or  an  able  business  man,  a  far-sighted,  clever  lawyer, 
a  man  deeply  learned  in  such  historical  studies  as 
pleased  him,  though  he  was  all  this ;  but,  considering 
'his  stock  and  position,  he  is  noticeable  for  his  very 
singular  social  habits  and  personal  behavior.  He 
had  no  airs  about  him ;  he  dressed  as  plainly  as  the 
mechanic  he  hired,  often  more  so ;  he  knew  every- 
body, and  spoke  in  a  bluff  hearty  way  to  them  all; 
he  liked  the  village  store  and  the  street  corner  at 
times,  as  much  as  he  did  his  fine  library  at  home ;  he 
knew,  earlier  than  most,  everything  that  went  on  in 
town,  and  was  known  to  control  almost  everything 
in  town  affairs  ,  popular,  without  a  single  intimate ; 
hard  in  a  business  trade,  with  a  soft  heart  for  vaga- 
bonds and  all  distress ;  a  contradictory  man  at  the 
surface  of  his  conduct ;  but,  as  every  one  knew,  a 
very  able  man  and  apt  to  give  good  advice.  So, 
when  the  question  was  put  to  him,  everybody  lis- 
tened for  the  answer. 

" What's   the   matter?"   he    said,   repeating    the 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  15 

question  before  answering.  "  What  do  you  ask  me 
that  for  ?  You  don't  want  to  know,  and  if  I  tell  you 
you  will  only  laugh  at  me  and  go  your  own  way  as 
usual.  I  know  you ;  first-rate  fellows  most  of  you, 
when  nobody  crosses  your  sweet  wills,  but  if  any 
honest  man  tells  you  the  plain  truth  in  a  plain  way, 
and  it  doesn't  happen  to  please  your  politics,  you 
abuse  him  like  a  pickpocket.  You  call  that  free 
speech." 

"But  can't  you  stand  some  hard  words,  squire, 
when  you  know  you  are  right  ?  "  asked  Jim  Stetson, 
the  oldest  foundry-man  in  the  crowd. 

"Certainly  I  can,  when  it  pays.  But  I  do  object; 
to  stirring  you  up  when  it  won't  do  any  good  but 
rather  hurt.  I  am  afraid  I  can't  convert  you." 

"But  what,  squire,  is  the  matter  with  the  old 
foundry  ?  " 

"  That's  a  long  story.  Perhaps  you  won't  listen, 
and  I  won't  speak  unless  you  will ;  but  if  you  will 
listen  and  keep  quiet  I  don't  mind  telling  you  what 
the  matter  is.  If  you  don't  like  what  I  say,  that's 
your  matter,  not  mine.  Medicine  is  not  always 
sweet,  and  the  truth  is  not  alwaj^s  agreeable." 

"  Go  on,  and  give  it  to  us,  squire,"  said  several. 

"  Well,  then,  I  will,  and  use  no  soft  words,  either. 
I  will  call  a  spade  a  spade,  whether  it  dig  a  grave  or 
a  post-hole.  Now,  then,  most  of  you  are  Republicans. 
That  procession  was  celebrating  your  victory.  Your 
vote  went  with  the  winning  side.  You  are  proud 
that  your  party  was  the  winning  horse  in  the  race. 


16  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

You  say,  perhaps  you  think,  that  you  have  voted  for 
the  interests  of  the  country  and  your  own.  I  know 
you  are  wrong.  Every  laboring  man  who  voted 
this  year  for  the  Republicans  voted  against  the  poor 
man's  table,  against  his  babe's  cradle,  against  his 
wife's  comfort,  against  his  own  hearthstone,  against 
his  own  roof-tree,  against  his  own  pluck,  brain,  bone, 
and  sinew;  yes,  and  against  the  present  and  future  of 
man,  and  the  United  States  to  boot.  It  may  have 
been  a  crime  or  a  blunder;  one  thing  it  was  and  is, 
—  a  curse  to  every  honest  laborer  in  the  land.  Now, 
you  took  stock  in  that  torchlight  procession.  If  that 
band  had  played  a  dirge,  and  the  torchlights  put 
into  crape,  with  a  chaplain  at  the  hall  to  say  prayers 
for  the  dead,  that  procession  would  have  meant  the 
fact,  to  wit,  that  the  election  had  been  a  calamity  to 
the  people,  and  killed  a  deal  of  comfort  and  happi- 
ness in  the  homes  of  men  who  toil,  —  in  your  homes, 
as  you  will  find  out.  You  helped  do  it.  You  hurt 
both  yourselves  and  me.  You  didn't  mean  it,  I  con- 
fess ;  but  whatever  you  meant,  it  hurts,  all  the  same, 
all  of  us.  I  don't  even  blame  you.  '  The  sin  of 
ignorance  God  winks  at,'  the  good  Book  says.  Mr. 
Cleveland,  who  had  rather  be  right  than  be  president, 
was  beaten,  not  by  General  Harrison,  but  by  General 
Ignorance  ;  and  what  I  do  blame  you  for  is  this, 
that  you  didn't  look  sharper  and  deeper  below  the 
surface  of  trade.  I  knew  long  ago  what  was  hurt- 
ing us,  you  didn't.  No,  all  honest  labor  in  the  land 
has  suffered  a  great  disaster  in  the  defeat  of  the 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.  17 

Democratic  party  and  its  principles.  Rabham  has 
got  to  take  its  share  of  the  losses.  You  and  I  are 
in  the  same  boat.  You  ask  me  about  the  foundry. 
You  know  I  have  got  my  money  and  other  folks' 
in  there,  and  the  other  folks  are  often  widows 
and  orphans,  who  haven't  had  a  dividend  for  the 
last  two  years,  nor  are  likely  to  have  for  some  time 
to  come.  It  is  hard  enough  for  you,  but  don't  forget 
that  in  all  such  closing  of  factories  there  are  many 
others  who  often  suffer  bitterly,  while  you  suppose 
they  are  rich.  My  grandfather  built  that  foundry, 
and  three  generations  of  men  have  worked  in  it,  and 
made  money  for  themselves  and  the  stock-owners. 
We  have  been  losing  money  steadily  for  some  five 
years  now,  while,  as  you  know,  many  of  our  neigh- 
bors have  shut  up ;  and  it  was  only  late  this  after- 
noon that  the  stockholders  voted  to  shut  down  here, 
and  I  put  that  notice  on  the  mill  door  to-night  in 
order  to  give  you  early  warning,  and  I  am  not  very 
happy  over  the  outlook.  The  simple  fact  is  that 
that  foundry  is  shut  up  by  the  unequal  and  cruel 
laws  of  this  nation,  made,  defended,  and  maintained 
by  the  Republican  party,  who  have  now  a  four-years' 
lease  of  power.  By  natural  position,  Pennsylvania 
has  iron  and  coal  almost  at  hand.  She  can,  there- 
fore, save  a  profit  by  this  nearness,  while  we  have  to 
pay  large  freight  on  both  coal  and  iron  which  we  get 
from  her.  Let  that  State  enjoy  those  natural  advan- 
tages. But  we  also  have  a  natural  position  of  ad- 
vantage. We  are  on  the  sea.  Nova  Scotia  coal  and 


18  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

iron  are  at  hand.  Cheap  iron  ore  is  to  be  had  from 
Cuba,  and  old  iron  brought  as  ballast  at  a  cheap 
rate  can  reach  us  from  all  quarters  of  the  globe. 
There  was  a  deal  of  old  iron  from  the  Suez  ship  canal 
that  was  used  a  few  years  ago  in  our  own  foundry. 
But  now,  then,  the  law  steps  in  and  takes  away 
these,  our  natural  advantages.  It  builds  a  wall 
against  all  this  cheap  coal  and  iron.  It  says,  fc  You 
shall  not  buy  where  it  is  cheapest,  but  where  I  say, 
at  home,  in  Pennsylvania.'  So  Pennsylvania  gets  all 
the  Lord  gave  her,  and  we  get  nothing  which  God 
or  man  has  given  us,  but  permission  to  pay  her  toll. 
I  find  no  fault  with  the  gifts  of  God,  but  I  do  com- 
plain that  the  law  takes  away  our  share  of  it.  I 
make  the  rough  estimate  that  we  pay  three  dollars 
more  than  we  ought  for  every  two  tons  of  iron,  and 
somewhat  less  for  every  two  tons  of  coal.  Give 
me  that  saving,  and  I  can  keep  the  foundry  going, 
and  pay  a  dividend.  The  government  takes  the 
tax,  and  has  closed  my  shop.  Perhaps  you  call  that 
fair  play.  I  don't.  Perhaps  you  call  that  being 
free  and  equal  before  the  law.  I  don't.  The  glass 
factory  in  Sandham  closed  the  other  day  because 
it  could  not  make  a  dividend.  Give  it  even  the 
saving  it  would  make  had  its  coal  been  free,  and 
it  would  have  done  so  easily.  My  wonder  is  not 
that  we  have  shut  down  here,  but  that  we  have 
managed  to  keep  going  so  long. 

"Now,  you  once  get  a  thing  going  wrong,  and, 
unless  you  reform,  the  wrong  gets  bigger  every  year, 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  19 

from  bad  to  worse  always.  There  is  no  standing 
still.  Where  this  tariff  now  makes  one  disaster  like 
ours,  it  will  make  ten  if  you  let  it  work.  For  my 
part,  I  always  believe  in  cutting  out  a  cancer,  as  the 
patient's  only  hope  ;  and  our  tariff  is  a  cancer,  and  a 
big  one  to  boot." 

There  was  some  commotion  among  the  shoe- 
boxes,  about  this  time,  and  a  buzz  in  the  smoke, 
as  if  somebody  was  getting  angry.  Whereupon 
emerged  and  stood  forth  a  tall,  sturdy  foundry-man, 
Henry  Farmer,  whom  his  shopmates  called  "  Hen  " 
for  short.  Farmer  was  a  good  mechanic,  and  had 
free,  honest  blood  in  his  veins.  As  the  world  went, 
he  was  an  honest  man.  But  he  was  ignorant  and 
narrow,  and  once  he  got  astride  an  idea  it  always 
ran  away  with  him  and  landed  him  quite  outside 
reason  or  common-sense.  In  his  own  way,  he  did 
a  deal  of  thinking,  only  it  was  always  upside  down 
or  wrong  side  up,  and  if  there  were  handles  to  his 
argument  he  was  sure  to  lay  hold  on  the  wrong  one. 
He  was  a  provokingly  obstinate  man.  If  it  took 
one  surgical  operation  to  get  a  new  idea  into  his 
head,  it  certainly  took  as  many  as  two  to  get  a  bad 
one  out.  He  talked  a  deal  more  than  he  knew,  — 
but  he  talked  on,  and  indeed  was  the  usual  spokes- 
man for  several  of  his  shopmates,  even  for  those 
who  had  better  heads.  His  politics  were  Republi- 
can, and  of  that  rabid  sort  which  thinks  its  party 
holds  all  the  virtues  and  its  antagonists  all  the  vice 
of  the  land.  So,  at  the  squire's  last  outburst  of 


20  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

accusation,  "  Hen  "  opened  his  mouth  in  his  usual 
way :  — 

"  That's  false — don't  you  forget  it.  What  are  we 
here  for  but  to  make  a  living,  and  how  can  we  make 
a  living  if  those  darned  fellers  across  the  water  — 
them  pauper  laborers,  send  over  their  goods  here 
and  undersell  us  ?  Hard  times  enough  now  to  get 
a  living,  but  it's  nothing  to  what  we  should  have 
if  everybody  brought  in  here  everything  folks 
wanted,  and  leave  other  folks  to  starve  or  go  to 
the  poorhouse.  No.  Protection  is  good  enough 
for  me,  boys.  We  must  have  it;  we  shall  go  to 
ruin  if  we  don't  have  it.  This  talk  of  yourn,  squire, 
is  all  nonsense.  You  are  one  of  them  dar nation 
free  traders  that  wants  England  to  come  in  and 
clean  us  out." 

"  Never  you  mind  what  I  am,  Farmer,  but  what  I 
say,"  replied  the  squire.  "  I  have  minded  what  you 
say  and  don't  call  you  names,  because  I  happen  to 
know  you  are  wrong.  You  have  got  everything 
mixed  up  as  usual,  —  a  grain  of  truth  in  a  bushel 
of  error,  and  I  am  not  just  now  hired  by  any  mis- 
sionary society  to  preach  to  you.  I  wish  you  a 
better  mind,  by  which  I  mean  I  wish  you  would 
get  hold  of  a  few  facts  before  you  try  to  lead  your 
neighbors  on  the  wrong  track.  I  don't  care  a  straw 
to  keep  on  with  this  conversation.  Some  of  you 
asked  me  to  speak,  and  I  have  spoken.  What  you 
call  protection  is  either  a  good  thing  or  a  bad  thing. 
If  good,  we  all  want  it ;  if  bad,  all  ought  to  set  their 


OR,    OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          21 

faces  against  it.  I  say  it  is  bad  —  root,  branch,  and 
fruit.  I  say  it  is  a  curse,  a  robbery.  As  slavery 
was  said  to  be  the  sum  of  all  villanies,  so  I  say 
the  American  tariff  is  the  sum  of  all  mendacity ; 
and  if  you  give  me  a  chance  I  will  prove  it." 

"  Prove  it !  "  shouted  half  a  dozen  excited  voices. 

The  squire  meditated.  "  You  can't  expect  me  to 
undertake  the  job  to-night,"  he  said  finally.  "  But 
I'll  tell  you  what.  Meet  me  to-morrow  evening, 
seven  sharp,  in  the  moulding-room  of  the  foundry, 
and  I'll  make  my  words  good  or  get  out.  Let  every 
man  come  who  likes,  and  let  him  say  his  say  and 
make  it  good  if  lie  can.  I'll  be  there." 

So  in  their  own  way  and  time  the  men  went  home. 
A  few  went  down  to  read  with  their  own  eyes  the 
ominous  announcement  on  the  foundry-door.  Pat 
Maloney,  who  had  been  smoking  his  black  "du- 
deen  "  all  the  evening,  with  his  eyes  wide  open  at 
the  squire,  when  speaking,  gave,  while  going  out, 
his  ideas  of  protection,  as  he  had  imbibed  them  with 
his  marital  experiences. 

"  By  jabers,  it's  pertection  that's  a  jewel.  If  all 
the  blissed  saints  would  only  pertect  me  from  me 
wife's  tongue  o'  nights  when  I  come  in  late  from  me 
mug  o'  beer,  and  all  the  foin  fellows  at  me  inn  in 
Pig  Lane  !  Sure,  pertection's  my  man,  me  boys." 


22  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 


CHAPTER   II. 

THERE  was  a  crowd  at  the  foundry  the  next 
night,  and  on  time.  The  foundry  was  a  large, 
rambling  structure,  built  long  ago  into  a  hillside 
with  its  west  end  butting  out  on  the  marsh,  and 
stood  a  little  out  of  the  village,  under  a  grove  of 
pitch-pine  trees  on  the  sand-hill  above.  To-night, 
as  Horace  Freeman  came  in  to  find  the  crowd 
seated  on  the  moulding-flasks  round  the  main  fur- 
nace, where  they  had  gathered  for  warmth,  the  few 
scattered  lights  about  gave  a  dim,  if  not  a  reli- 
gious, light  to  the  place,  and  the  huge  openwork 
beams  of  the  roof  cast  their  stout  shadows  almost 
everywhere. 

"  Now,  my  friends,"  said  Mr.  Freeman,  as  he  took 
his  place  among  the  crowd,  in  a  chair  some  one  had 
set  for  him,  "  here  we  are  face  to  face  to  discuss  the 
question  of  our  bread  and  butter.  As  we  have  no 
chairman,  we  all  of  us  must  help  keep  some  sort  of 
order.  It's  no  use  talking  tariff  or  anything  else 
under  the  sun,  all  in  a  jumble,  '  all  heads  and 
points  '  as  we  say,  like  a  bushel  of  pins  emptied 
into  a  peck  measure.  I  want  any  man  who  likes  to 
break  in  upon  me  when  it  suits  his  convenience,  or 
he  thinks  he  has  got  me.  But  I  think  that  a  fellow 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  23 

who  talks,  with  nothing  to  say,  ought  to  be  put  in 
a  jug  and  the  stopple  pounded  in  after  him.  This 
country  would  be  a  great  sight  better  off  if  half  the 
politicians  were  treated  that  way,  to  give  the  work- 
ing-men and  all  of  us  a  rest.  I  see  some  of  you 
have  brought  your  dogs  with  you.  If  you  let  them 
quarrel  in  the  dark  there  behind  the  furnace,  I  will 
have  them  all  turned  out.  Yet  your  very  dogs  have 
the  bones  they  eat  cursed  by  this  very  tariff  that, 
as  I  say,  curses  you.  They  get  fewer  bones,  be- 
cause, at  high  prices,  their  master  and  his  family 
must  eat  more  soup-meat  and  simmer  the  bones  for 
their  soup.  So,  while  they  can't  vote  and  won't 
attend  to  me,  let  them  stay  as  fellow-sufferers  with 
us  all. 

"Now,  then,  to  business.  I  am  a  neighbor  of 
yours.  You  know  me.  Now  tell  me  what  axe 
you  think  I  have  got  to  grind.  I  have  enough  to 
eat  and  wear,  with  a  house  over  my  head.  I  was 
never  in  politics  and  never  shall  be.  What  do  I 
want  then  ?  Simply  fair  play  for  myself  and  you ;  — 
which  this  tariff  denies  me ;  for  you,  because  I  know 
that  if  you  don't  get  it  I  can't.  Perhaps  you  think 
I  am  making  haste  slowly.  So  I  am.  When  any 
one  of  you  buys  a  piece  of  wild  land  for  a  house-lot, 
the  first  thing  you  do  is  to  grub  out  the  roots  and 
stumps  in  order  to  lay  a  solid  foundation.  I  am 
now  going  to  do  a  little  clearing  up.  Now  what  is 
the  tariff?  A  tariff  is  a  tax  levied  on  certain  im- 
ports into  this  country  by  the  Government  at  Wash- 


24  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

ington,  just  as  exactly  and  truly  as  the  selectmen  of 
Rabham  levy  every  year  a  town-tax  on  you.  Now 
just  tell  me  this :  do  you  long  to  pay  your  town-tax  ? 
do  you  dote  on  paying  it?  If  you  do,  why  not 
keep  on  paying  it  every  week  over  and  over  and 
become  as  rich  as  a  Vanderbilt  doing  it  ?  No ! 
every  sane  man  knows  that  his  tax  is  so  much  clean 
money  gone  out  of  his  pocket,  and  he  wants  his  tax 
as  small  as  possible.  In  our  town-meeting  you  are 
always  talking  about  keeping  town-taxes  down,  and 
grumbling  at  the  assessors  if  they  put  one  dollar 
more  on  your  tax-bill.  You  pay  those  taxes  because 
you  get  a  return  for  them  in  almshouses,  schools, 
highways,  and  the  general  police  of  the  town.  But 
all  the  same  your  town-taxes  cost  you  their  face 
value,  and  if  you  could  have  all  these  town  advan- 
tages without  your  tax,  you  would  think  yourselves 
so  much  in,  and  so  you  would  be.  But  now  suppose 
you  are  compelled  to  pay  these  town-taxes  and  yet 
get  nothing  back  from  them,  what  would  you  do 
then  ?  You  would  kick  out  your  selectmen ;  curse 
the  whole  business ;  shoot  the  sheriff  who  came  to 
sell  you  out ;  try  to  change  the  law,  and  if  it  must 
be  war,  revolution,  you  would  betake  yourselves  to 
the  fields  and  highways,  as  your  fathers  did  against 
British  taxation  and  tyranny,  lugging  your  shotguns 
or  rifles  with  you,  and  fight.  You  would  say,  4  We 
are  born  free,  and  we  mean  to  stay  so.  For  any 
government  to  take  our  money  and  give  us  nothing 
for  it,  is  a  steal,  it  is  tyranny,  and  the  men  who  sub- 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.  25 

mit  to  the  oppression  are  slaves  —  American  white 
slaves  to  boot.'  But  suppose  that  the  Government 
took  your  taxes,  your  property,  and  not  only  gave 
you  nothing  back,  but  used  that  very  money  to 
injure  your  business  and  take  away  your  comforts 
and  the  happiness  of  your  families." 

"A  blamed  Secessioner ;  oughter  go  out  of  the 
Union  and  join  the  rebs,"  remarked  "  Hen  "  Farmer 
to  his  next  neighbor  on  the  plank  which  a  row  of 
men  were  occupying. 

"  Not  a  bit,  Farmer,"  rejoined  Freeman,  who  had 
overheard  the  remark.  "Of  all  men,  the  most  dan- 
gerous and  wicked  man  is  he  who,  in  a  land  like  this 
where  the  people  make  the  laws,  advises  and  assists 
in  breaking  the  law  or  using  armed  violence  against 
it,  even  when  the  law  is  an  unjust  one.  For,  unjust 
or  no,  that  law  is  the  will  of  a  majority  of  the  people, 
and  to  strike  the  law  is  to  smite  your  own  face,  as 
one  of  that  people  which  makes  laws  and  obeys 
them  until  the  majority  changes.  He  is  the  worst 
enemy  of  the  people  who  advises  violence  against  a 
wrong  in  order  to  come  at  their  rights.  Free  speech, 
free  discussion,  free  thought,  free  ballots,  free  men, 
will  in  the  long  run  see  that  right  is  done.  Now 
men  like  me  say  that  our  tariff,  that  is  our  tax,  does 
this  very  thing.  So  far  as  the  protection  in  it  goes, 
it  takes  away  our  money  and  gives  us  nothing  in 
return,  and  worse  than  that  it  takes  our  money  and 
so  spends  it  that  it  cripples  all  our  American  indus- 
tries by  which  we  might  make  more  money  to  pay 


26  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

our  taxes  and  other  bills  and  to  come  home  —  shuts 
down  this  foundry  where  you  have  been  used  to  earn 
your  bread.  I  only  assert  this  now,  but  I  will  prove 
it  by  and  by." 

"  Do  you  mean  to  say,  squire,  that  we  are  all  such 
fools  hereabouts  that  we  are  robbed  this  way  and 
yet  don't  know  it  ? "  said  an  elderly  man  in  the 
crowd,  who  happened  to  be  a  carpenter,  and  had 
come  in  with  the  others. 

"Leaving  the  'fool'  business  out,  for  I  mean  all 
through  to  attack  things,  not  men,  that's  exactly 
the  size  of  the  whole  business.  You  are  robbed  and 
you  don't  know  it,  nor  the  why  nor  the  how  of  it. 
I  firmly  believe  that  if  the  tax  gatherer  came  boldly 
to  you  and  demanded  all  the  tax  which  each  of  you 
actually,  but  in  an  indirect  way,  pays  every  year, 
not  to  the  Government,  but  to  certain  of  your  fellow 
citizens  who  are  smarter  than  you  are  and  so  have 
got  the  inside  track,  the  whole  tariff  question  would 
be  settled  in  any  three  months,  and  settled  that  this 
tariff  should  go  out  as  the  biggest  robber,  with  a  face 
of  the  most  shameless  brass,  that  ever  was.  Now 
what  difference  does  it  make  to  my  pocket  whether 
a  highwayman  with  a  bludgeon  takes  a  hundred 
dollars  from  me,  or  some  sneak,  from  behind  a  wall, 
takes  a  hundred  dollars  out  of  my  pocket  with  a 
suction  hose?  For  myself,  and  I  think  you  would 
agree  with  me  after  thinking  it  over,  I  would  prefer 
the  highwayman  as  a  plain  villain.  The  suction  hose 
was  a  trick,  and  we  got  taken  in.  The  political 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  27 

economists  call  the  suction-hose  business  indirect  tax- 
ation, which  is  always  most  liable  to  abuse  because 
it  is  indirect  and  hidden,  while  you  can  see  and 
examine  a  direct  tax  when  the  bill  comes  in.  Let 
me  give  you  an  example.  A  gas  company  puts  gas 
into  a  block  of  stores  and  charges  the  owner  a  round 
sum  which  he  pays  the  company.  So  far  he  is  out 
say  one  or  three  thousand  dollars,  as  the  case  may 
be.  What  does  he  do  ?  He  adds  interest  on  this 
one  or  three  thousand  dollars  to  the  rent  of  this 
block  of  stores,  dividing  it  up  among  his  tenants,  let 
us  say  in  a  fair  proportion.  Now  if  the  store  owner 
gets  his  rents  on  this  new  basis,  as  he  generally  does, 
who  has  really  paid  for  putting  in  the  gas?  The 
consumer,  of  course,  and  every  time.  That  is  an 
indirect  tax  paid  for  a  direct  advantage.  The  same 
is  true  of  water.  A  landlord  puts  water  into  his 
block  of  tenement  houses.  He  pays  the  water  board 
the  cost,  and  then  turns  round  and  raises  his  tenants' 
rents  who  consume  the  water  and  pay  for  it,  in  many 
cases  overpay  for  it,  since  the  landlord  is  sharp 
enough  to  leave  for  himself  a  margin  and  save  him 
from  a  poorer  per  cent  investment  in  his  houses  than 
there  was  before  the  water  was  put  in.  An  indirect 
tax,  but  a  real  one,  and  the  consumer  pays  it." 

"But  you  didn't  raise  the  rent  on  us  when  you 
put  in  water  last  year,  squire,"  interrupted  one  of 
the  crowd. 

"No,  I  didn't,  because  I  have  a  few  bowels 
of  compassion  still  left,  after  being  cursed  these 


28  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

twenty  years  by  this  tariff.  I  thought  you  had  taxes 
enough  to  pay  already,  and  so  I  paid  the  bills 
myself.  But  that's  not  business.  It  is  an  exception 
which  only  proves  the  rule  that  the  consumer  pays 
the  tax,  municipal,  state,  and  national.  And  I  want 
to  say  just  here,  that  there  is  hardly  any  rule  or 
law  rightly  laid  down  or  possible  to  be  laid  down  in 
this  tariff  business  to  which  there  are  not  one  or 
several  exceptions.  But  if  the  rule  be  true,  the  ex- 
ception, when  examined,  only  proves  it.  Don't 
forget  this,  because  the  protectionist  has  a  general 
habit,  when  a  tariff  reformer  hits  him  with  a  hard 
fact  or  law,  to  answer  by  bringing  out  the  ex- 
ception,, and  some  men  never  take  the  pains  to  dis- 
criminate between  the  law  and  the  exception,  and  so 
the  exception  goes  for  law.  It  is  a  way  some  folks 
with  a  bad  case  manage.  Now  I  am  not  sorry  I 
paid  those  bills  myself.  The  fact  is,  that  in  late 
years  I  have  seen  the  laboring  classes  so  plundered 
and  defrauded  by  all  sorts  of  people,  especially 
politicians  in  the  pay  of  monopolists,  that  I  would 
rather  lose  my  right  hand  than  have  it  lay  a  bur- 
den on  their  heavy  pack,  or  one  straw  in  their  way 
which  is  hard  enough  at  the  best,  as  times  go.  Talk 
of  taxation  by  tyrants !  There  never  was  such  tax- 
ation as  we  have.  I  saw,  last  election  clay  at  the 
polls,  a  hundred  men,  who  by  the  law  of  this  State 
(and  I  am  happy  to  say  that  few  other  States  follow 
this  bad  custom),  men  who  never  earn  over  three 
hundred  dollars  a  year,  out  of  which  they  must 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.  29 

keep  themselves  and  families,  —  were  yet  compelled 
to  pay  each  two  dollars  poll-tax  before  they  were 
allowed  to  vote.  And  the  meanest  of  all  false- 
hoods that  any  man  can  concoct  is  to  say  of  these 
men,  as  they  do,  that  if *a  man  doesn't  think  enough 
of  his  franchise  to  pay  two  dollars  tax  for  his 
privilege,  and  so  help  support  the  Government,  it 
is  no  hardship  to  him,  and  he  ought  to  be  refused 
his  vote.  Now  just  look  at  it.  Every  man  of  them, 
as  he  came  to  the  polls,  was  covered  all  over  with 
taxes  which  he  had  already  paid,  on  boots,  hat, 
cap,  shirt,  flannels,  coat,  breeches,  buttons,  suspen- 
ders—  everything  except  his  very  flesh  and  blood 
and  skull,  which  he  was  using  every  day  to  help  pay 
these  very  taxes,  one-third  of  his  time  as  it  is  com- 
puted; and  at  the  polls  they  'protected'  him  as  an 
American  citizen,  two  dollars  more  out  of  his 
pocket.  Think  of  it,  men  !  " 

There  was  a  pause  just  here.  For  two  dogs  had 
just  got  by  the  ears,  and  were  tumbling  about  in  the 
black  heap  of  moulding-sand  by  the  furnace,  so  that 
a  big  dust-cloud  obscured  the  gas  and  the  company. 
After  they  had  been  put  out,  as  had  been  promised, 
the  speaker  went  on. 

"  I  have  already  said  that  the  tariff  is  a  tax  and 
the  consumer  pays  it.  I  want  now  to  give  you  a 
little  history  of  the  American  tariff  that  you  may 
better  see  how  things  are.  Our  first  tariff  was 
passed  in  1789,  our  last  one  in  1883.  There  have 
been  fifty-five  tariff  acts  in  these  ninety-four  years. 


30  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

Most  of  these  acts  did  not  make  radical  changes. 
Those  which  did  are  eight,  and  are  named  as  fol- 
lows:  Hamilton  Tariff,  1789;  Calhoun  Tariff,  1816; 
Clay  Tariff,  1824;  Abominations  Tariff,  1828;  Com- 
promise Tariff,  1833;  Whig  Tariff,  1842;  Walker 
Tariff,  1846  ;  Merrill  Tariff,  1861.  '  The  Abomina- 
tions Tariff '  was  so  called  because  its  enemies  in 
Congress  had  so  loaded  it  down  with  absurd  and 
wicked  amendments  that  they  thought  it  would 
never  pass.  But  it  did  all  the  same,  and  is  '  mercy, 
truth,  righteousness,'  and  all  the  virtues  when  com- 
pared with  the  present  tariff  we  are  living  under. 
The  tariff  tax  rose  from  15  per  cent  in  1791  to  69 
per  cent  in  1813 ;  sunk  to  6  per  cent  in  1815,  then 
rose  to  27  per  cent  in  1816;  and  so  kept  on  rising 
and  falling  at  intervals  until  it  reached  its  highest 
in  1868  as  48.63  per  cent.  It  is  to-day  47.10.1 
Washington  never  saw  a  tariff  tax  as  high  as  20  per 
cent.  Mr.  Mills's  proposed  bill,  on  which  the  Demo- 
cratic party  stood  in  the  late  election  and  has  just 
been  beaten,  left  the  tariff  tax  just  42.49,  or  more 
than  double  the  tax  in  Washington's  day.  But  then 
you  know  we  did  not  have  so  pure  or  so  wise 
patriots  in  Congress  then  as  now ;  wise  because 
some  of  them  know  enough  to  go  to  Washington 
poor  and  come  back  rich ;  pure,  because  when  they 
are  about  to  pass  some  big 'job 'in  Congress,  the 
country  is  flooded  with  congressional  patriotism  in 
the  shape  of  printed  speeches  which  nobody  ever 
heard,  and  very  few  read  when  printed.  Now,  con- 

1  See  note,  p.  223. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  31 

sidering  all  the  circumstances,  I  have  a  great  respect, 
and  even  good  will,  for  our  old  statesmen  and  their 
modest  tariff  bills,  and  many  of  the  arguments 
which  they  made  in  support  of  them.  They  said : 
6  We  have  just  come  out  of  a  long  and  expensive 
war ;  we  are  in  debt ;  the  nation  has  no  credit, 
and  hardly  money  enough  to  pay  the  most  necessary 
daily  expenses  of  carrying  on  Government ;  we  are 
only  three  millions,  scattered  over  a  wide  and 
sparsely  populated  country ;  we  have  little  experi- 
ence in  manufactures ;  capital  is  not  organized,  and 
there  is  not  much  of  it  anyhow.  First  of  all,  we 
must  establish  the  credit  of  the  national  govern- 
ment and  pay  our  bills,  exercising  the  greatest  cau- 
tion in  contracting  debts,  and  the  greatest  economy 
in  spending  the  people's  money.  To  do  this  the 
nation  must  have  a  fixed  and  adequate  income,  and 
the  best  way  to  get  it  is  by  a  tax  or  tariff  on  imports, 
as  all  other  nations  do.'  So  far  forth  the}r  stood  on 
the  same  ground  that  the  Democratic  party  does 
to-day  and  always  has,  —  which  Mr.  Cleveland  has 
so  clearly  explained  in  his  messages  —  a  tariff  for 
revenue  only.  But  our  old  statesmen  went  a  step 
farther  in  their  explanations.  They  said:  'Our 
enemy  in  war  has  been  England.  Our  enemy  in 
peace  is  England.  England  undertook  to  destroy 
our  manufactures  and  so  brought  on  war.  Now  she 
will  undertake  to  destroy  our  manufactures  by 
underselling  us  in  our  home  market.  She  has 
experience,  skilled  mechanics,  capital,  population, 


32  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

and  we  have  not ;  she  shows  her  enmity  towards 
us  every  way.  Let  us  then  keep  out  English  goods 
by  taxing  them  and  let  our  own  people  get  a  start.' 
That  was  their  idea  of  protection.  I  confess  there 
was  a  deal  of  truth  and  much  practical  necessity  in 
it ;  it  certainly  looks  plausible.  Anyway,  that  is 
what  they  did.  A  young  plant  needs  care  in  a 
cornfield  or  anywhere  else.  But  their  argument 
only  applies  to  our  tariff  as  the  circumstances 
then  and  now  are  the  same.  Are  they  not  almost 
utterly  different?  We  are  sixty  millions, —  a  nation, 
rich,  experienced,  organized,  grown  up,  and  they 
were  as  I  have  said.'' 

There  was  another  interruption  here,  and  from 
Pat  Maloney,  whose  Irish  blood  was  stirred  up  when 
the  name  of  England  was  mentioned. 

"Ah,  your  honor,  it's  ould  England,  the  beast, 
that's  always  kilt  ould  Ireland  intirely.  To  the 
divil  wid  her !  " 

"  That's  true,  Pat,"  said  Mr.  Freeman,  "  only  you 
must  put  a  grain  of  salt  to  it  to  make  it  all  right. 
The  English  aristocracy,  the  English  landlords,  the 
English  protectionists,  the  English  governing  classes, 
in  the  old  days,  stripped  and  vexed  both  nations, 
America  and  Ireland,  and  by  doing  so  lost  the  one 
and  still  have  a  hope  that  they  may  save  the  other. 
The  English  people  have  never  been  the  enemy 
of  either  of  us,  and  are  now  more  our  friends 
than  ever.  Protection,  not  free-trade  England,  de- 
stroyed Irish  industries  by  a  law  in  the  reign  of 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  33 

William  and  Mary,  in  1698,  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years  before  there  was  any  free  trade.  No,  Pat ; 
protection  never  had  any  pity  and  very  little 
shame,  and  never  will. 

"  But  to  continue.  What  may  be  called  the 
Henry  Clay  doctrine  of  protection  came  in  later  in 
that  statesman's  day,  and  took  generally  the  old 
line  of  argument,  but  with  some  additions.  It  said  : 
4  Our  manufactures  are  in  their  infancy.  Keep  out 
foreign  goods  until  our  factories  can  compete  with 
English  factories.  Thus  you  will  build  up  Amer- 
ican manufactures  and  so  multiply  them  that  by 
home  competition  our  goods  will  go  down  in  price 
below  what  they  were  at  the  start,  until  the  con- 
sumers, that  is,  you  the  people,  by  getting  these 
reduced  prices  will  get  back  more  than  the  extra 
money  you  paid  the  manufacturers , to  help  them  to 
keep  on.  Otherwise,  foreign  competition,  backed  by 
foreign  cheap  labor,  will  undersell  our  manufactur- 
ers until  they  go  bankrupt ;  and  when  the  foreigner 
comes  into  control  of  the  American  home  market 
he  charges  what  he  likes.'  There  was  also  some- 
thing said  of  our  making  ourselves  independent 
of  foreign  nations,  especially  in  time  of  war,  like 
that  old  exploded  humbug  and  spook,  the  war-cry 
of  the  English  aristocracy,  '  England  for  English 
workmen  and  English  goods,'  ten  thousand  times 
dinned  into  English  ears  until  the  common  sense 
of  the  English  people,  led  by  such  men  as  Bright 
and  Cobden,  drove  out  all  this  nonsense  with  the 


34  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

new  war-cry,  'England,  man  and  money,  for  herself, 
because  she  will  trade  free  with  the  whole  world.' 
And  England  to-day  shows  that  the  people  were 
right. 

"  Mr.  Clay  estimated  that  it  would  take  from  six 
to  nine  years  for  these  infants,  these  manufactures, 
to  grow  up  so  as  to  take  care  of  themselves.  At 
least  sixty  years,  in  some  cases  an  hundred  years, 
have  passed,  and  not  a  mother's  son  of  them,  as  the 
protectionist  holds,  has  yet  grown  up.  They  never 
will.  They  never  mean  to.  So  long  as  their  pap  is 
made  by  tariff  laws  out  of  the  people's  money,  they 
intend  to  suck.  They  don't  propose  to  be  weaned. 
I  say,  take  away  their  pap,  whether  they  make  a 
wry  face  or  not,  and  let  them  earn  their  own  pap 
as  all  honest  men  do,  and  they  will  be  the  better 
and  stronger  for  it.  As  things  are  at  present,  these 
infants  are  going  to  multiply  on  our  hands.  Every 
fellow  who  starts  a  new  business,  an  unreasonable, 
and,  so  to  speak,  an  impossible  business,  like  raising 
hot-house  bananas  in  Vermont,  wants  protection, 
of  course,  against  the  cheap,  pauper  bananas  of 
the  West  Indies  and  South  America,  by  a  high 
tariff  tax  against  them,  —  which  means  that  he 
wants  you  who  buy  bananas  to  pay  him  for  running 
his  absurd  business.  If  he  got  his  'protection'  it 
might  be  a  good  thing  for  Vermont,  by  bringing  in 
new  workmen,  new  property  to  be  taxed  by  the 
State  and  town,  just  exactly  as  it  often  helps  a 
neighborhood  to  have  a  lunatic  asylum  or  a  prison 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  35 

come  to  it.  But  who  pays  the  bills  for  all  this, 
and  how  much  profit  is  there  to  the  Commonwealth 
in  a  lunatic  asylum  or  any  such  houses?  Any  enter- 
prise under  the  sun  can  make  a  dividend  for  some- 
body if  fools  enough  can  be  found  to  pay  the  bills 
and  support  it  like  any  other  pauper.  No  ;  any  en- 
terprise which  is  reasonable  can  get  on  in  this  land 
on  its  own  merits,  if  wisely  managed,  and  if  it  can- 
not, I  say  it  is  plain  truth  that  it  ought  not.  The 
people  ought  not  to  be  made  pack-horses  to  bear  all 
the  asininity  of  absurd  ventures,  and  I  say,  let  all 
such  futile  and  costly  infants  be  gathered  to  their 
fathers,  with  this  inscription  on  their  tombstones : 
6  Here  lie  the  American  infants  who  ought  never  to 
have  been  born.' 

"  That  the  Henry  Clay  theory  failed  to  satisfy  the 
country  is  plain,  from  the  fact  that  his  tariff  was 
very  soon  and  very  materially  changed,  so  that 
when  our  Civil  War  began,  in  1861,  we  had  had 
from  1841  a  very  low  tariff,  beginning  with  some 
25  per  cent  tax,  and  ending  in  1861  with  the  lowest 
tariff  since  1818,  —  an  average  tax  of  not  quite  19 
per  cent.  Then  the  war  forced  the  nation,  in  pre- 
serving the  Union,  to  spend,  not  millions,  but  billions 
of  money;  sums  that  no  man  can  imagine  or  compre- 
hend. Yet  this  nation,  as  the  Democratic  party, 
and,  indeed,  all  good  citizens  have  always  held,  must 
pay  its  debts  and  maintain  its  credit.  So  every  patri- 
otic man  agreed  that  everybody  should  be  taxed, 
and  taxed  upon  almost  everything.  There  never 


36  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

was  a  tax  so  enormous  as  the  Merrill  Tariff.  That 
is  the  tariff  which  now  is,  and  which  the  Democratic 
party  have  just  tried  to  lower  in  the  interests  of  the 
people  who  pay  the  tax.  It  was  like  an  atmosphere, 
enveloping  the  people  with  extra  cost  in  living. 
'  We  live,  move,  and  almost  have  our  being '  in  this 
tax  atmosphere.  Now  I  agreed  then  and  I  say  now, 
that  all  this  taxation  was  necessary,  and  so  did  the 
Democratic  party.  Everybody  knew  and  everybody 
said  that  all  this  taxation  was  a  temporary  measure, 
and  that  when  our  war  debt  was  paid,  or  largely 
paid,  most  of  these  taxes  should  cease.  Mr.  Morrill 
said  so.1  Now  I  say,  and  here  I  make  my  first  spe- 
cific charge  against  this  tariff  robbery,  that  to-day  it 
stands  for  a  broken  contract  which  the  Republican 
party,  which  was  in  power  when  the  bill  was  passed, 
made  with  this  nation,  and  which  it  now  refuses 
to  fulfill,  to  wit,  that  this  war  tariff,  when  the  war 
was  over  and  our  debt  was  reduced  within  manage- 
able dimensions,  should  cease,  and  a  more  moderate 
one  take  its  place.  They  have  never  done  it,  nor 
tried  to  do  it.  Nor  will  they;  nor,  under  the  baleful 
and  misguiding  charlatanism  of  bad  leadership,  con- 
trolled by  the  great  monopolies  of  the  land,  can 
they.  In  spite  of  the  warnings  of  their  own  great 
leaders  like  Lincoln,  Garfield,  Arthur,  McCullough, 
Folger  (the  last  two  being  Republican  ex-secretaries 
of  the  treasury),  they  have  followed  their  blind 
guides  until  they  have  all  fallen  into  a  ditch  from 
which  they  cannot  soon  crawl  out.2 

1  See  speeches  of  May  8,  1860,  and  June  2,  1864. 

2  See  note,  p.  225. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          37 

"  The  Republican  party,  then,  now  occupies,  in 
some  respects,  a  new  position  on  the  tariff  question ; 
or,  at  the  very  least,  emphasizes  the  old  positions  of 
protectionists,  so  called,  by  exaggerating,  distorting, 
and  burlesquing  them.  It  has  all  the  old  cant  about 
'  infant  industries/  '  America  for  Americans,'  the 
dangers  from  'pauper  labor  abroad,'  and  actually 
shrieks  for  '  protection '  to  the  laboring  people 
against  foreign  goods.  Its  only  gospel  is  protec- 
tion, and  what  it  lacks  in  truth  it  makes  up  in  brass. 
It  intends  to  keep  the  present  tariff  forever,  and,  if 
it  revise  it  at  all,  to  revise  it  by  raising  it.  I  know 
very  well  that,  under  Republican  administrations, 
certain  of  the  war  taxes  have  been  taken  off,  — 
three  hundred  million  dollars  a  year,  at  the  very 
least.  But  how  and  why  ?  Let  me  tell  you.  Dur- 
ing the  war  all  manufacturers,  business  men,  men 
with  incomes, — in  fact,  everybody  who  had  any- 
thing to  tax,  were  taxed  on  all  their  business  trans- 
actions, and  this  was  a  part  of  'the  internal  revenue,' 
so  called.  The  Government  said  to  the  business 
men,  and  especially  to  the  manufacturers,  'We  are 
now  taxing  your  business  heavily,  and  we  ought  to 
protect  your  business  stoutly  in  order  that  you  may 
stand  the  strain  which  the  internal  revenue  makes 
on  you.  We  have  given  you,  therefore,  a  high 
protection  against  your  foreign  competitors.'  Now 
then,  what  taxes  were  taken  off  after  the  war?  The 
internal  revenue  taxes  from  the  manufacturers. 
Were  the  high  taxes  with  which"  the  tariff  '  pro- 

y^V       OF  THE         ^T^v 

rciitEKszTn 


38  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

tected  '  them — taxes  paid,  too,  by  every  man  who 
bought  their  wares  —  taken  off?  Not  much.  What 
was  sauce  for  the  goose  was  not,  in  this  case,  sauce 
for  the  gander,  and  never  will  be  so  long  as  the 
Republican  party  is  in  power.  The  manufacturers 
got  rid  of  their  war  taxes ;  you  haven't.  That's 
what's  the  matter,  partly.  Let  me  give  a  few  figures. 
"  The  income  tax  (172,000,000)  was  taken  off  from 
460,170  persons,  with  a  net  annual  income  of  $707,- 
000,000,  while  the  rest  of  us  had  only  income  enough 
to  support  us.  The  internal  tax  on  our  home  manu- 
factures in  1866,  $127,000,000,  was  taken  off,  and 
the  manufacturers  held  on  to  all  the  millions  of  tariff 
taxes,  which  went  to  their  pockets.  The  taxes  on  cor- 
porations, banks,  railroads,  and  the  like,  were  taken  off, 
millions  or  more  from  the  rich,  and  the  common  people 
forgotten.  To  sum  up,  in  another  man's  words  which 
I  will  read  from  this  scrap  of  paper,  the  fact  about  this 
discrimination  in  favor  of  the  few  and  against  the 
many,  6  Was  the  tax  of  3  per  cent  on  the  domestic 
blanket,  paid  by  the  manufacturer,  more  oppressive 
than  the  tax  of  79  per  cent  on  both  foreign  and 
domestic  blankets,  paid  by  the  people?  Was  the 
tax  of  3  per  cent  on  a  wool  hat,  paid  by  the  manu- 
facturer, more  oppressive  than  the  tax  of  73  per  cent, 
paid  by  the  consumer?  Was  the  tax  of  3  per  cent 
on  women's  and  children's  clothing  more  oppressive 
than  the  tax  of  82  per  cent  on  the  same  articles  which 
the  consumer  paid  for?  Was  a  tax  of  3  per  cent  on 
the  corporations  more  oppressive  than  an  88  per  cent 


OR,    OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  39 

tax  on  woollen  shawls  ?  Was  a  3  per  cent  tax  on 
incomes  more  oppressive  than  an  80  per  cent  tax  on 
a  woollen  shirt?  Gentlemen  claim  that  they  have 
reduced  taxes  $360,000,000,  and  point  to  the  splen- 
did column  which  they  have  erected ;  but  that  col- 
umn has  no  stone  in  it  to  tell  of  their  devotion  to 
the  masses  who  live  by  daily  toil.  It  is  built  of 
blocks  of  marble,  every  one  of  which  speaks  of  favor- 
itism to  the  wealthy,  of  special  privileges  to  rich  and 
powerful  classes.  In  1883  they  finished  the  magnifi- 
cent shaft  which  they  have  been  for  years  erecting, 
and  crowned  it  with  the  last  stone  by  repealing  the 
internal  tax  on  playing  cards,  and  putting  a  20  per 
cent  tax  on  the  Bible.' 

"Now,  my  friends,  I  have  tried  to  give  you  as 
honest  a  history  as  I  could  of  all  our  tariffs  since 
1789,  including  the  present  one,  in  order  that  you 
may  see  how  things  have  been  going  on  in  a  tariff 
way  since  the  founding  of  our  Government.  I  think 
I  can  vouch  for  the  facts,  and  my  comments  on  them 
you  can  weigh  for  yourselves.  Perhaps  you  think  I 
haven't  got  on  very  far,  but  if  you  choose  to  come 
to-morrow  evening,  I  will  go  on.  I  wish  you  all 
good-night." 

As  the  men  were  going  out,  Henry  Farmer  emerged 
from  the  black  darkness  of  the  melting  furnace  with 
a  particular  roll  to  his  gait,  as  if  he  was  trying  to 
move  just  one  half  of  his  body,  while  the  other  stood 
still,  —  a  loping  way  he  always  assumed  when  he 
was  greatly  stirred  up  about  anything ;  and  as  he 


40  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

came  to  where  Mr.  Freeman  was,  halted  with  his 
hands  in  his  breeches  pockets,  and  a  jerk  to  his  head 
and  "  went  for  him." 

"  Now,  squire,  it's  mighty  curious  that  a  man  like 
you  should  talk  so.  If  it  hadn't  been  for  old  Cleve- 
land we  shouldn't  have  heard  no  sich  stuff  about  this 
here  tariff,  that's  good  enough  for  me,  nor  this  shut- 
up  in  this  here  foundry.  People  are  scared  to  death 
by  this  free  trade,  and  old  Cleveland's  to  blame  for 
it;  but  what  would  you  expect  of  a  feller  who  vetoed 
the  poor  soldiers'  pension  bill?  Poor  stuff!  " 

"  Wrong  as  usual,  you  are,  Farmer,"  replied  Mr. 
Freeman.  "  Just  hold  on  a  bit.  You  certainly  won't 
say  that  this  foundry  is  to  be  shut  up  because  Mr. 
Cleveland  wasn't  elected,  though  a  good  many  Re- 
publican manufacturers  tried  to  bulldoze  their  help 
about  election  time  by  telling  them  that  their  fac- 
tories would  be  closed  if  he  was  elected.  The  mean- 
est of  these  fellows,  —  and  I  say  that  all  such  people 
who  interfere  in  this  way  in  a  national  election  ought 
by  statute  law  to  be  sent  to  a  felon's  cell  for  the  in- 
timidation,—  after  the  Republican  victory,  cut  down 
his  workmen's  wages,  and  when  they  struck  against 
him,  called  on  the  police  of  the  city  of  New  York  to 
protect  him  and  his  factory  against  the  men  and 
women  lately  in  his  employ  whom  he  had  first  tried 
to  frighten,  and  then  to  skin.  But  let  that  go.  You 
were  a  soldier  in  the  late  war,  weren't  you  ?  " 

"  Yes,  I  was." 

"And,  as  a  soldier,  do  you  think  it  quite  the  thing 


OR,    OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.          41 

to  call  a  man  who  has  been  for  the  last  four  years, 
as  President,  commander-in-chief  of  the  army  in 
which  you  served,  cold  Cleveland'?  You  needn't 
answer  that,  which  is  a  little  matter,  but  I  under- 
stand you  to  blame  Mr.  Cleveland  for  his  vetoes  of 
certain  pension  bills." 

"  Yes,  I  do,  and  the  boys  do,  and  we  went  agin 
him  for  it."  • 

"  Do  you  know  anything  about  the  soldiers'  pen- 
sion bills  he  vetoed  ?  " 

"  Know  ?  why,  in  course  I  know ;  he  was  all 
wrong,  and  that's  what's  the  matter  with  him." 

"  Now,  then,  let  me  tell  you.  If  you  are  an  honest 
man,  as  I  think  you  are,  a  good  citizen,  as  I  am  sure 
you  mean  to  be,  if  you  knew  the  facts  you  would 
honor  Mr.  Cleveland  for  those  very  vetoes.  For,  see ; 
when  he  came  into  office,  the  annual  pension  roll 
under  the  Republican  administration  was  about 
$38,000,000.  In  1887,  when  he  had  still  more 
than  a  year  to  serve,  that  roll  had  risen  to 
not  quite  $53,000,000.  Since  his  election  he  has 
approved  over  thirteen  hundred  private  pension 
acts,  while  but  about  fifteen  hundred  such  acts 
were  passed  for  the  entire  twenty-four  years  the 
Republican  party  was  in  power,  so  that  Mr.  Cleve- 
land has  approved  almost  as  many  pension  acts  as 
all  the  Republican  Presidents  from  Lincoln  to  Ar- 
thur.1 It  is  perfectly  true  that  he  vetoed  what  is 
known  as  the  Dependant  Pension  Bill  with  the 
approval  of  the  best  men  and  papers  of  both  parties ; 

1  See  note,  p.  200. 


42  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

among  them  General  Quay,  now  chairman  of  the 
Republican  National  Committee  and  senator-elect 
from  Pennsylvania,  himself  a  soldier,  who  said, 
•'That  veto  message  is  the  best  thing  President 
Cleveland  has  put  his  hand  to,  and  if  I  were  in  the 
Senate  I  would  vote  to  sustain  him.  There  is  not  a 
man  in  my  Grand  Army  Post  in  favor  of  that  bill.' 
Now  as  to  his  vetoes  of  private  pension  bills,  that  is, 
bills  in  favor  of  individuals,  he  vetoed  one  hundred 
and  ninety-nine  of  them.  And  why  not  ?  Of  these 
claims,  over  ninety  had  been  before  rejected  by  the 
Pension  Bureau  under  Republican  administrations. 
These  bills  are  passed  by  Congress  in  a  hurry.  On 
one  occasion  in  the  Senate  in  a  session  of  seventy 
minutes  one  hundred  and  forty-seven  of  these  pension 
bills  have  been  passed,  or  more  than  two  a  minute. 
Both  Houses  of  Congress  depend  on  their  commit- 
tees to  examine  and  introduce  all  such  bills,  and, 
when  introduced,  are  usually  passed  as  a  matter  of 
course.  The  President  took  time  and  examined 
these  bills  before  signing  them,  and  so  saved  the 
country  and  the  true  soldiers  themselves  from  im- 
position. The  best  proof  of  that  is  that  not  one  of 
these  one  hundred  and  ninety-nine  bills  was  ever 
passed  over  his  veto.  In  fact  there  is  no  act  of  Mr. 
Cleveland's  administration  more  creditable  to  his 
manliness  than  these  very  vetoes.  All  lie  had  to  do 
was  to  keep  quiet  and  let  the  people's  treasury  be 
plundered,  and  I  think  the  campaign  lies  about 
them  were  the  most  contemptible  of  all.  What  he 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  43 

did  was  to  do  his  duty,  and  men  like  you  growl  at 
him  for  doing  it.  Every  sort  of  fraud  conceivable 
was  in  those  bills ;  bills  for  deserters  and  men  who 
had  actually  enlisted  and  fought  in  the  Confederate 
army ;  men  killed  in  street  brawls ;  men  who  drank 
themselves  to  death ;  men  who  committed  suicide ; 
men  claiming  all  sorts  of  hurt  and  disease  contracted 
in  the  war ;  men  who  had  never  been  in  the  war ;  all 
of  them,  through  their  heirs  or  claim  agents,  clamor- 
ing for  a  pension.  One  of  these  men  was  discharged 
from  the  hospital  in  1863,  and  his  discharge  certifi- 
cate states  that  he  'is  worthless,  fat,  imbecile,  lazy, 
totally  unfitted  for  the  Invalid  Corps  gr  for  any 
other  military  duty.'  Twenty  years  after,  he  claims 
a  pension  for  rheumatism  contracted  in  the  service, 
Congress  passes  it  somehow,  and  Mr.  Cleveland 
vetoes  it,  to  get  cursed  by  men  like  you  for  doing 
the  duty  he  swore  to  do  and  was  set  to  do  as  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States.  I  have  gone  into  this 
matter  with  you  because,  while  it  is  not  a  tariff 
matter,  it  seems  to  show  how  the  people's  taxes  are 
grabbed  at  in  Washington  ;"  how  extravagantly  they 
are  often  squandered  on  such  poor  sticks  as  this- 
man  was,  and  how  necessary  a  watchful  and  honest 
President  is  with  an  honest  economic  party  behind 
him  to  spend  those  taxes  which,  however  they  may 
have  been  wrung  from  them,  should  certainly  be 
spent  in  a  business-like  and  honest  way  in  the  in- 
terest of  the  men  who  pay  them.  By  the  way, 
Farmer,  I  think  you  get  a  pension.'' 


44  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

"  Yes,  a  small  one." 

"  And  where  does  it  come  from  ?  " 

"  From  the  people  at  Washington." 

"And  where  do  they  get  it?  not  out  of  their  own 
pockets,  I  suppose." 

"No,  out  of  the  treasury." 

"But  who  puts  this  sixty  or  eighty  millions  of 
dollars  into  the  treasury  ?  " 

"  I  suppose  they  who  must  —  folks  that  ought  to." 

"  Yes,  the  taxpayers. 

"  Now,  did  it  never  strike  you,  Farmer,  that  you 
soldiers  who  get  these  pensions  out  of  our  taxes,  and 
deserve  them  I  grant,  ought  to  be  the  last  men  in 
the  world  to  befriend  any  job  or  steal  that  plunders 
the  men  who  help  feed  you?  And  did  you  never 
think  that  because  the  army  roll  is  a  roll  of  honor, 
that  base  men  should  never  go  on  it ;  that  to  put 
them  on  it  is  to  dishonor  the  men  who  belong  on 
it?" 

"  Well,  I  never  exactly  thought  about  it." 

As  they  went  out  together,  Mr.  Freeman  said,  — 

"  What,  Farmer,  did  you  fight  for,  anyhow,  when 
you  were  under  the  old  flag  ?  " 

"  For  the  Union  of  course  —  for  the  country." 

"  And  you  fought  for  the  Union,  perhaps,  that  the 
people  of  the  country  in  your  day  and  in  genera- 
tions after  us  all,  might  be  free  and  equal  before  the 
law ;  might  raise  families,  make  money,  and  enjoy 
themselves  ?  " 

"  Something  like  that,  squire,  yes." 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  45 

"  Well,  now,  perhaps  you  would  agree  that  any  laws 
or  institutions  which  enslaved  and  degraded  men, 
which  made  un happiness  and  poverty,  in  a  word, 
which  took  away  our  American  birthright  from  us, 
so  far  as  they  went,  upset  all  you  soldiers  tried  to 
set  up,  worked  against  you,  in  one  word, beat  you?" 

"  Perhaps  so." 

"  Now  I  put  it  to  you  soldiers.  So  far  as  the 
American  tariff  takes  away  equal  rights  from  any 
man,  makes  one  man  help  pay  for  carrying  on 
another  man's  business,  takes  away  the  people's 
comfort,  just  so  far  it  takes  away  the  fruits  of  our 
free  Government  which  you  fought  to  maintain.  I 
say  this  tariff  does  exactly  that." 


46  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 


CHAPTER   III. 

NEXT  evening  Mr.  Freeman  found  the  crowd 
gathered  about  Henry  Farmer  at  a  gaslight,  reading 
aloud  out  of  the  village  newspaper  which  had  come 
out  that  afternoon.  Farmer,  apparently,  had  but  just 
begun,  and  stopped  as  soon  as  he  saw  the  squire. 
The  latter  said,  — 

"  What's  up  now,  men  ?  " 

"Oh,  it's  politics  as  usual,"  said  one,  "and  all 
about  this  old  foundry." 

"Then  by  all  means  go  on,"  said  the  squire  ; 
"  never  spoil  a  story  for  relations'  sake.  Let's  have 
it." 

So  Farmer  began  at  the  beginning  and  read.  It 
was  an  editorial  for  which  the  shutting  down  of  the 
foundry  served  as  a  text,  and  contained  the  usual 
protection  arguments  about  "infant  industries,"  "  pro- 
tection to  American  wages,"  "foreign  pauper  labor," 
all  winding  up  with  an  appeal  to  the  mechanics  of 
Rabham  to  stand  by  their  families  and  their  country 
even  if  the  heavens  fell,  though  the  writer  failed  to 
state  exactly  what  would  become  of  "  the  dear  old 
tariff "  when  all  other  things  had  passed  away. 
Indeed  it  was  an  appeal  so  hot  that  it  would  make 
almost  any  protectionist  red  in  the  face  reading  it. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  47 

The  gist  was,  that  the  American  tariff  was  to  be 
entirely  let  alone,  as  a  continental  blessing  and  the 
hope  of  the  American  world,  as  if  it  were  a  sort  of 
sacred  Grand  Llama  in  Thibet,  or  as  holy  as  would 
be  the  tombs  of  all  the  prophets  who  have  been 
since  the  world  began.  The  article  concluded  by  a 
reference  to  the  foundry  meetings,  and  the  expres- 
sion of  a  hope  that  the  men  of  Rabham  would  not 
be  misled  by  a  man  who  was  a  Democrat.  Farmer 
read  it  all,  only  stumbling  over  some  of  the  big 
words,  when  the  crowd  assisted  him ;  and  when  he 
ended  all  eyes  were  turned  on  the  squire,  who  stood 
bent  forward  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  listen- 
ing. When  he  righted  himself,  his  first  word  was  a 
clear,  big,  long  whistle,  that  went  clambering  up  and 
on  in  among  the  sooty  rafters.  Then  he  said,  — 

"  I  like  that,  now ;  that's  plucky,  that's  brassy ; 
that  looks  as  though  the  man  meant  business.  The 
editor  is,  of  course,  infallible  in  types  and  knows 
everything  except  the  facts.  Do  you  know,  my 
friends,  what  a  toy  kaleidoscope  for  children  is? 
It's  a  glass  box  with  a  handle  to  it,  and  inside  the 
box  innumerable  small  bits  of  colored  glass  which, 
as  you  turn  the  handle,  fall  into  all  sorts  of  com- 
binations which  never  look  or  are  exactly  twice 
alike.  Now  the  protection  argument  is  exactly  like 
that  toy,  brilliant  colors,  yet  only  bits  of  broken 
glass  jumbled  in  a  heap.  You  might  as  soon  expect 
these  bits  of  glass  to  fall  into  the  shape  of  a  Chinese 
pagoda,  or  the  cap  of  Liberty,  as  to  expect  that  any 


48  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

argument  for  protection  can  have  much  logic  in  it 
or  will  stick  together.  You  can't  build  with  it.  It's 
not  in  the  thing.  It's  born  absurd,  and  you  can't 
hide  from  any  clear-headed  man,  who  honestly 
wishes  for  the  truth,  its  birthmark.  Now,  I'm  not 
going  to  answer  this  young  man's  argument,  because 
that's  too  smj»!l  game  to  fire  at ;  but  I'm  going  for 
his  masters,  and  ours  too,  I  mean  the  monopolists 
who  are  all  to  a  man  protectionists.  When  he  is 
older  I  hope  he  will  know  better.  But  he  pays  me 
one  compliment  which  I  wish  to  thank  him  for.  He 
says  I  am  a  Democrat,  and  so  I  am." 

"  You  were  a  Republican  in  the  war,  weren't  you, 
squire?"  asked  Farmer. 

"  Certainly  I  was." 

"  And  isn't  that  a  '  cussed  turncoat '  ?  " 

"Not  at  all.  A  turncoat  is  one  who  turns  his  coat 
to  conceal  who  he  is,  like  a  coward.  But  if  I  wear 
my  own  coat,  and  go  openly  from  one  camp  to  the 
other,  I  may  be  a  deserter,  but  I  do  not  turn  my 
coat.  My  coat,  my  coat-of-arms,  is  my  country.  In 
the  war  I  thought  my  country,  her  interests  and  her 
union,  went  with  the  Republicans.  So  I  went  too. 
Under  like  circumstances  I  would  do  the  same 
to-morrow.  The  interests  of  the  country,  ever  since 
the  war,  have  gone  with  the  Democratic  party.  So 
I  go  with  them,  as  do  nearly  all  the  old  Republicans 
here  in  the  East  who  made  the  Republican  party.  I 
do  not  know  how  it  may  be  in  the  West.  The  Repub- 
lican party  here  is  like  a  potato,  the  best  part  under 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  49 

ground.  I  believe  that,  as  the  two  parties  are  to- 
day, if  Abraham  Lincoln,  Charles  Sumner,  John  A. 
Andrew,  and  all  such  representative  men  were  alive, 
they  would  be  in  the  Democratic  party.  Why? 
Because  the  Democratic  party  now  stands  for  the 
prosperity  and  happiness  of  the  United  States,  and 
the  other  fellows  don't/' 

"  How's  that  for  high,  for  a  muggerwump  ?  "  ejac- 
ulated Henry  Farmer. 

"  High  or  low,  it's  common  sense  and  common  hon- 
esty and  good  citizenship,  all  the  same.  I  don't  say 
you  should  change  your  party  every  time  it  does 
something  you  don't  like,  or  nominates  a  poor  stick 
for  office.  Parties  have  their  uses,  and  must  be  ;  but 
they  are  only  organizations,  — means  to  an  end,  the 
service  of  country,  by  which  men  may  carry  on  pub- 
lic affairs;  and  every  man's  first  duty  is  to  his  coun- 
try, and  .only  to  his  party  for  his  country.  So  when 
a  man's  country  stands  on  one  side,  and  his  party  on 
the  other  side,  and  he  does  not  go  with  his  country, 
he  commits  high  treason  against  the  nation.  It 
comes  with  a  very  bad  grace,  either  from  an  Ameri- 
can or  a  Republican,  to  sneer  at  the  Independents  in 
politics.  Who  was  it  made  the  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence, and  whose  Fourth  of  July  is  it  when  they 
read  it  in  great  assemblages  of  free  men,  every  year? 
Why,  ours,  of  course.  The  Republican  party  itself 
was  born  of  the  old  Whig  party,  and  killed  its  mother 
in  childbirth.  A  Democrat,  made  so  by  his  intelli- 
gence and  his  conscience,  you  can  trust  every  time. 


50  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

Some  of  the  others  you  can  sometimes  buy,  in  the 
year  we  elect  a  president,  especially  if  there  is  plenty 
of  'soap  '  or  '  fat '  in  their  enemies'  campaign  strong- 
box. 

"  So  much  for  all  that.  I  have  before,  as  you  re- 
member, explained  to  you  that  the  tariff  is  a  tax,  and 
an  indirect  tax;  and  I  have  explained  what  an  indi- 
rect tax  is  by  showing  you  what  the  landlord  does 
when  he  puts  in  gas  or  water  for  his  tenants,  and  how 
the  consumer  pays  all  such  taxes.  I  have  also  shown 
you  the  general  arguments  of  the  protectionists.  I 
am  now  about  to  show  you  how  these  same  men  have 
set  up  and  arranged  our  tariff  for  protection  to  please 
themselves.  Before  I  do  so  I  am  going  back  to  the 
question  as  to  who  pays  the  tariff  taxes,  because  it 
has  been  a  favorite  mis-statement  of  these  gentlemen 
that  the  foreign  manufacturer  does;  or,  as  one  of  the 
most  powerful  of  the  many  tariff  leagues  puts  it, 
'The  tariff  is  a  license  which  the  foreigner  pays 
America  for  using  its  markets.'  That  is  simply  not 
so.  Yet  this  untruth  is  one  of  their  outpost  riflepits, 
which  they  have  dug  to  keep  tariff  reformers  from 
getting  into  their  camp.  Now,  let  me  fill  up  that 
hole.  What  is  the  fact  ?  A  foreigner  sends,  let  us 
say,  some  cloth  here.  At  the  custom  house  he  or 
his  agent  pays  the  tariff  tax,  and  that  goes  into  the 
treasury  at  Washington.  Then  he  adds  that  tax 
to  the  cost  of  the  goods,  and  caps  it  with  his  profit, 
including  interest  on  the  money  paid  for  the  tax, 
and  then  charges  the  man  who  buys  his  cloth  the 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  51 

whole  sum.  Now,  the  foreigner's  money  is  in  Wash- 
ington, but  it  is  paid  back  to  him  by  the  consumer, 
very  much  as  one  express  company  pays  the  back 
dues  of  another  on  a  package,  and  collects  the  whole 
amount  of  the  man  to  whom  that  package  is  con- 
signed. That  is  the  way  business  is  done,  and  if 
you  don't  believe  it,  ask  any  honest  importer  in  the 
land.  I  know  there  are  exceptions  to  it,  which,  as  I 
have  told  you  before,  only  prove  the  rule.  A  man 
may  send  goods  here,  and  pass  them  through  the 
custom  house,  and  they  may  be  burnt  next  day  with- 
out insurance,  in  which  case  the  foreigner  does  pay 
all  the  tariff  tax  and  all  those  goods  cost  him,  unless 
he  go  insolvent ;  or  lie  may  import  the  goods  and 
give  them  away,  but  that  is  not  business,  it  is  charity; 
or  he  may  make  a  mistake  and  lose  75  per  cent  of 
his  whole  venture.  In  that  case  he  is  certainly  out 
of  pocket  the  tariff  tax  and  more,  but  that  is  bad 
business,  and  he  is  not  apt  to  repeat  it.  If  he  knows 
it,  he  doesn't  mean  to  sell  goods  to  Yankees  unless 
he  profits  by  it.  Trade  between  two  men  or  two 
nations  is  not  a  jug  with  the  handle  all  on  one  side, 
but  a  jug  with  two  handles,  and  if  either  party  to 
trade  misses  his  handle  he  smashes  the  jug.  Remem- 
ber this,  because  when  I  come  to  show  you  what 
pack-horses  the  American  people  are  made  under 
their  tariff  load  of  taxes,  some  of  you  Republicans 
may  wince,  and  try  to  escape  the  logic.  The  con- 
sumer pays  the  tariff  tax  on  what  he  consumes,  un- 
less he  steals  it,  or  finds  it,  or  lives  in  an  almshouse. 


52  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

"  Now,  then,  we  have  a  so  called  protective  tariff 
in  the  United  States  which  the  protectionists  have 
made  to  carry  out  their  ideas.  There  can  only  be 
three  kinds  of  tariff:  1.  A  tariff  for  revenue  only. 

2.  A  tariff  for  revenue  with  incidental   protection. 

3.  A  tariff  for  protection  as  its  main  business.     Let 
me  take  the  last  first.     I  suppose  that  the  tariffs  of 
Germany,  France,  the  United  States,  and  every  other 
so-called  'protected'  nation  come  under  this  head. 
And  it  is  this  kind  of  tariff  now  and  here  that  I  shall 
examine   as  to   its   operation   and   results.     Now  if 
protection  be  a  good  thing  it  is  hard  to  see  how  we 
can  have  too   much  of  it,  and  that  would  be   the 
wisest  tariff  which  kept  out  the   most  or  kept  out 
all.     In   fact  the  only  things  absolutely  forbidden 
by  the  American  tariff  as  at  present  made  up  are 
counterfeit    money,   obscene    pictures,  and  foreign- 
built  ships.     The  ships  are  apparently  the  only  one 
of  the  three  that   conform  to  the  law.     Assuming 
that  such  a  tariff  existed,  all  foreign  goods  are  kept 
out  and  the  Government  gets  not  one  cent  of  reve- 
nue, since  tariff  taxes  to  the  Government  are  never 
paid  on  what  is  kept  out  but  only  on  what  comes 
in,  or,  as  somebody  puts  it,  'revenue  ends  where  pro- 
tection begins.'     I  am  sure  that  no   civilized  nation 
could  live  under  such  a  tariff,  though  it  might  do  for 
a  South   Sea    Islander   who   was   content   with    his 
yams  and  his  bamboo  hut  and  had  never  seen  a  ship 
or  a  civilized  jack-knife.     Yet  some  extreme  protec- 
tionists  have   believed   in  such  a  tariff.     The   late 


OR,    OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  53 

Henry  G.  Carey  of  Philadelphia,  the  ablest  Ameri- 
can writer  on  the  side  of  protection,  said  that  it 
would  be  better  for  the  United  States  if  the  ocean 
were  a  sea  of  fire  to  keep  away  all  foreign  importa- 
tions. Horace  Greeley  has  said  that  under  certain 
conditions  of  trade  the  smoke  of  a  locomotive  was 
the  black  flag  of  a  pirate  bent  on  destroying  civiliza- 
tion. These  are  usually  the  kind  of  men  who  think 
that  a  new  labor-saving  machine  in  any  useful  art  is  a 
curse  to  the  laborer,  while  the  history  of  labor  shows 
that  every  such  invention  is  a  blessing.  Perhaps 
the  easiest  way  to  test  such  a  theory  would  be  to 
try  it  on  for  a  month  or  so,  and  begin  with  killing 
every  locomotive  in  the  land  and  leave  transporta- 
tion to  the  carters  who  would  certainly  for  a  time 
have  plenty  to  do.  I  am  not  sure  but  the  logic  of 
the  protection  argument  would  drive  a  logical  pro- 
tectionist to  that. 

"  Then  there  is  (1)  a  tariff  for  revenue  only.  This 
is  the  theory  and  always  has  been  of  the  Democratic 
party.  It  is  also  the  theory  on  which  Great  Britain 
collects  her  revenue.  She  taxes  only  six  articles  or 
classes  of  articles,  none  of  which,  it  is  assumed,  are 
produced  at  home :  viz.,  cocoa,  tea,  chiccory,  dried 
fruits,  tobacco,  and  wine.  The  other  duties  are  im- 
posed to  offset  the  internal  revenue  tax  on  certain 
British  industries  and  give  them  a  fair  show,  and  are 
put  on  such  imports  as  distilled  liquors,  malt  liquors, 
gold  and  silver  plate,  playing  cards,  etc.  In  other 
words  she  lets  ;  every  tub  stand  on  its  own  bottom 


54  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

and  do  its  own  coopering.'  This  is  what  free  trade 
means  as  applied  to  England,  a  people  with  a  tariff 
and  with  tariff  taxes,  but  arranged  on  a  different 
basis  from  what  ours  is,  for  instance.  There  is  no 
absolute  free  trade 'in  the  world,  that  is,  trade  with- 
out any  tax,  unless  it  be  among  the  people  of  the 
same  nation,  and  they  all  pay  town  and  state  taxes 
at  least,  as  a  part  of  their  license  to  trade ;  while  the 
untaxed  trade  between  the  different  States  of  the 
Union  is  the  most  gigantic  exhibition  of  absolute 
free  trade  on  the  face  of  the  globe.  Such  free  trade 
as  between  our  States  has  worked  well  so  far  and, 
unless  the  contrary  can  be  proved,  affords  a  pre- 
sumption that  so-called  protection  may  not  always 
be  a  good,  nor  free  trade  always  and  to  all  extents  an 
evil.  Yet  a  free  trader  of  the  English  or  of  the 
American  tariff  reformer's  style  has  too  often  been 
held  up  as  a  monster  —  a  cross  between  a  mad  dog 
and  a  fool. 

"  (2)  A  tariff  for  revenue  with  incidental  protec- 
tion, that  is  where  the  revenue  is  put  first  and  pro- 
tection second.  That  may  be  done  by  fixing  the 
tariff  so  low  that  all  foreign  goods  will  not  be  shut 
out,  so  that  the  Government  gets  its  revenue,  and  }Tet 
the  tax  on  them  be  made  high  enough  to  stimulate 
home  industries  by  giving  them  this  tariff  tax  as  an 
advantage  to  help  them  against  the  foreigner.  This 
plan  is  the  most  expensive  of  tariff  ways  for  the  con- 
sumer who  finally  foots  the  bill,  because  in  this 
way  the  Government  gets  only  a  little  of  the  tax, 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  55 

while  the  consumer  pays  all,  and  the  bigger  part 
goes  to  certain  of  his  fellow  citizens  who  know 
how  to  feather  their  own  nest  with  feathers  plucked 
from  his  meek  neck.  For,  look.  There  is  an  import 
tax  of  50  per  cent  on  a  certain  grade  of  cloth  (any 
other  example  would  do  as  well).  Under  that  tariff 
150,000,000  of  that  cloth  is  imported.  The  Govern- 
ment in  that  case  gets  $25,000,000  out  of  that  tax. 
But  the  country  must  have  1150,000,000  of  these 
goods,  and  its  home  manufacturers  make  the  other 
^100,000,000  which  the  tariff  has  kept  out.  Because 
of  the  advantage  given  them  over  the  foreigner  by 
the  tariff,  they  are  able  to  add  50  per  cent  more  to 
the  price  of  their  goods,  or  nearly  that,  and  get  it 
too,  unless  home  competition  breaks  the  market. 
That  is,  if  a  yard  of  cloth  made  outside  the  tariff 
wall  could  be  sold  at  one  dollar  there,  on  our  side 
the  wall  it  cannot  be  sold  for  less  than  a  dollar  and 
a  half.  Our  fellow  citizens,  the  cloth-men,  know 
this  and  sell  their  goods  at  the  top  price  or  very 
close  to  it.  In  this  supposed  case  they  have  got 
$50,000,000  bonus  out  of  the  tariff.  But,  mark  you, 
not  one  dollar  of  the  $50,000,000  has  gone  to  the 
Government,  but  into  their  own  pockets,  and  the  men 
who  paid  them  all  this  money  are.  the  consumers  of 
their  goods.  The  proportion  of  American  goods  to 
foreign  goods  which  we  use  is  about  five  to  one. 
Therefore,  where  one  dollar  is  paid  into  the  treasury 
as  a  tariff  tax,  five  dollars  have  been  paid  by  us  to  the 
American  manufacturer  in  the  shape  of  a  bonus  or 


58  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

subsidy.  As  we  raise  every  year  about  $200,000,000 
by  the  tariff  on  these  goods,  we  must  pay  about 
$1,000,000,000  to  the  manufacturers.  Do  you  wou- 
der  that  some  men  here  have  grown  enormously  rich 
while  the  masses  remain  stationary,  or  that  wealth 
is  becoming  more  unequally  distributed  every  year? 
Almost  any  idiot  can  eat  if  you  feed  him,  and  these 
'infant  industries'  swallow  a  deal  off  the  poor  man's 
table.  This  is  how  our  tariff  raises  prices,  and  not, 
as  the  protectionist  says,  lowers  them.  For,  what 
under  the  sun  do  they  want  protection  for,  or  how  irt 
heaven's  name  can  they  get  it  if  the  tariff  lowers 
prices?  Did  you  ever  know  or  hear  of  any  man 
who  ever  went  round  begging  his  neighbors  to  help 
him  lower  the  price  of  the  thing  lie  had  to  sell?  Yet 
they  tell  us  that  a  protective  tariff  lowers  prices.  I 
know  it  does  sometimes,  but  how  ?  Only  by  creating 
a  disaster  by  which  few  can  profit.  It  is  this  way. 
A  high  protective  duty  is  put  on  some  manufacture. 
There  is  money  in  it,  and  everybody,  so  to  speak, 
goes  into  it,  the  halt,  the  lame,  and  the  blind,  every- 
body who  has  money  or  can  hire  some  whether  he 
have  experience  in  the  business  or  not.  Then  follows 
over-production  as  they  call  it  —  the  home  market  is 
glutted,  they  cannot  enter  the  foreign  market  be- 
cause there  they  must  deal  with  England  who  has 
free  raw  material  while  their  raw  material  has  b  en 
heavily  taxed  for  the  supposed  good  of  some  other 
industry.  They  can't  get  out  and  they  can't  get  on. 
They  therefore  go  down  like  a  row  of  bricks.  Some 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  57 

shut  down  or  close  up,  some  go  into  the  bankrupts' 
court,  and  a  few  hold  through.  Their  workmen  are 
in  distress  and  wander  about,  perhaps,  into  some 
other  business,  if  they  can  find  it,  and  a  select  few 
of  the  masters  hold  on  to  better  times,  which  come 
when  the  market  glut  is  over  and  the  people  are 
recovered  enough  from  the  panic  to  begin  to  buy. 
Under  protection,  because  of  this  business  situation 
it  creates,  when  prices  are  low  you  may  be  sure 
almost  nobody  of  the  laboring  or  professional  classes 
has  money  to  buy.  Now  that  is  the  history  of 
almost  every  protected  American  industry,  and  }ret 
I  haven't  told  half  the  misery  that  comes.  That  is 
one  reason  why  a  conservative  business  man  with 
his  eyes  open  ought  to  set  his  face  like  flint  against 
this  whole  protection  business.  It  seduces  capital 
from  healthy  channels  of  trade  into  unhealthy  ones. 
It  mocks  business  with  promises  never  kept.  It 
gives  a  feast  to-day  and  a  dish  of  bitter  herbs  to- 
morrow. It  is  a  bankrupt  with  a  lot  of  promissory 
notes  abroad  which  sooner  or  later  go  to  protest 
and  whose  face  value  is  never  paid. 

"  Now,  I  don't  say  that  we  won't  have  commercial 
panics  under  any  business  system  known  to  man- 
kind. Neither  protection  nor  free  trade  will  cure 
measles  or  the  cancer,  nor  save  gluttony,  either  at 
table  or  in  business,  from  physical  or  mercantile 
dyspepsia.  Neither  will  either  make  a  fool  wise  or 
save  a  man  from  punishment  if  he  violate  the  law  of 
his  stomach  or  his  business.  Under  any  system  of 


58  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

trade  the  frugal,  the  industrious,  and  the  sagacious 
will  have  the  inside  track  of  the  spendthrift,  the  lazy, 
and  the  short-sighted.  But  what  I  say  is,  that  when 
a  panic  does  come,  from  over-production,  protection 
aggravates  it,  because  a  protected  country  has  no  for- 
eign market  into  which  to  empty  its  glut,  and  so  go 
on  in  an  early  recovery.  A  free  trade  country  has. 
I  know  very  well  that  our  American  home  market 
is  the  best  and  biggest  market  in  the  world.  All 
wise  men  want  to  keep  it.  But  you  can't  keep  it 
and  thrive  on  it  unless  you  sell  outside  of  it.  The 
manufacturing  machinery  of  the  United  States  is  of 
that  magnitude  that  it  can  supply  the  home  market 
by  running  only  nine  months  in  the  year,  and  prob- 
ably less.1  But  what  of  the  other  three  months  — 
what  of  the  mechanics  out  of  work  a  quarter  of  the 
year  ?  Now  in  this  matter,  and  as  our  tariff  now  is, 
things  are  sure  to  go  from  bad  to  worse,  since  our 
machinery  multiplies  faster  than  our  population. 
We  are  not  Chinese,  but  a  part  of  that  civilized 
world  which  everywhere  is  moving  mightily  in 
developing  the  dynamic  and  economic  forces  of  the 
age.  I  mean  its  mechanical  inventions  and  its  new 
powers  to  produce  wealth.  Every  nation,  our  com- 
petitor, is  more  and  more  outgrowing  its  own  home 
market  and  seeking  foreign  markets  in  Asia,  Africa, 
in  the  isles  of  the  sea,  and  wherever  there  is 
any  trade,  actual  or  possible.  For  us,  in  such  a 
drift  and  growth  of  civilization,  to  shut  ourselves  up 
among  ourselves  and  trust  to  our  home  market,  is 

i  See  Mass.  Labor  Rep.  1887,  p.  294. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  5& 

both  impossible  and  suicidal.  The  best,  the  only 
way  to  protect  our  home  market  is  to  hew  open  a 
way  into  the  markets  of  the  world.  That,  protec- 
tion cannot  do,  for  it  cannot  contend  with  a  country 
like  England,  for  instance,  with  free  material,  while 
its  own  is  taxed  up  to  its  very  eyes.  Free  trade,  as 
I  have  explained  free  trade  to  be,  can.  I  claim,  in 
the  first  place,  then,  that  our  protection  has  not 
protected  our  own  home  market,  and  has  lost  us 
that  standing  in  the  world's  markets  which  our  na- 
tional ability  entitles  us  to.  If  my  claim  is  allowed 
by  the  court,  the  decision  is  final  against  protection, 
as  a  delusion  and  a  snare  in  the  business  of  the 
United  States.  I  want  to  say  one  word  more  about 
the  low  prices  with  which,  for  more  than  eighty 
years,  the  protectionist  has  promised  the  people 
should,  after  a  while,  compensate  themselves  for  the 
high  prices  with  which  they  subsidized  their  fellow- 
citizens —  the  manufacturers.  The  low  prices  did 
come,  would  come  every  day  now,  but  for  a  reason. 
The  glut  and  plenty  of  manufactures  in  our  home 
market  came  long  ago  and  many  times  ;  but  the  low 
prices  have  not  appeared  except  in  company  with 
business  disasters  of  which  I  have  spoken.  Why 
not  ?  Because  '  The  Trusts  '  have  come  and  stolen 
away  the  cheapness. l  When,  for  instance,  the  sugar 
refiner  finds  that  competition  and  over-production 
are  destroying  his  profits,  he  agrees  with  othar 
sugar  refiners  to  put  out  only  so  much  sugar  upon 
the  market  as  it  will  take  at  a  certain  price  ;  that  if 

1  See  note,  p.  231. 


60  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

it  be  necessary,  any  one  or  a  dozen  of  his  confeder- 
ates, at  the  order  of  the  trust  directory,  shall  shut 
up  their  refinery  and  dismiss  their  workmen.  Only, 
for  doing  that,  they  shall  receive  from  the  trust  an 
ample  dividend  on  their  capital  out  of  the  general 
'trust'  fund.  Thus,  at  the  very  time  when  the 
people  are  about  to  realize  cheap  sugar,  when  sugar 
is  abundant,  the  '  trust '  steps  in  and  makes  sugar 
high  and  scarce.  They  promised  us  bread  and  they 
gave  us  a  stone,  in  fact  two  millstones  —  an  upper 
and  a  lower  millstone  —  scarceness  and  dearness.  I 
cite  this  case  to  show  how  things  are  going,  and  as 
one  of  the  many  facts  which  go  to  show  what  a 
mockery  of  hope  and  right  business  methods  this 
whole  protection  theory  is.  It  cannot  be  reformed 
and  it  ought  to  cease." 

There  was  an  interruption  here,  and  an  uproar. 
A  board  on  which  a  half-dozen  men  were  sitting 
broke  sharply,  and  the  men  were  re-gathering  them- 
selves out  of  the  sand  dust  on  the  foundry  floor. 
There  was  a  laugh  all  round,  and  Mr.  Freeman 
said  :  — 

"  Well,  friends,  it's  about  time  this  meeting  broke 
up  too.  That  must  have  been  a  'protection  '  plank. 
Good-night." 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  61 


CHAPTER   IV. 

THE  next  night,  Mr.  Freeman  had  a  bundle  of 
papers.  "  Here,  men,"'  he  said,  holding  them  up, 
"are  some  figures,  or,  as  they  call  them,  statistics, 
by  which  I  intend  to  show  in  detail  that  our  tariff 
system  has  not  even  protected  our  home  market 
while  making  it  impossible  for  us  to  sell  in  a  foreign 
one,  and  so  has  cursed  the  bread  and  butter  of  this 
nation  on  both  sides  —  by  not  keeping  out  foreign 
goods,  as  it  promised  and  was  paid  for  doing  by  the 
tax  which  a  few  men  got,  and  the  many  (you 
among  them)  paid,  and  by  not  letting  us  out  into 
the  world's  markets  to  buy  and  sell  as  we  saw  fit. 
Now,  I  want  to  put  you  on  your  guard  against 
me  and  everybody  else  in  this  matter  of  tariff  sta- 
tistics. Figures  won't  lie,  but  you  may  lie  terribly 
with  them,  all  the  same.  Nothing  is  easier  for  an 
unscrupulous  man  than  to  cut,  dry,  misplace,  dis- 
tort, and  especially  omit  —  to  put  a  half  for  a 
whole  —  so  as  to  make  figures  tell  almost  any  tale 
he  pleases.  There  have  been  cases  at  Washington, 
and  they  are  likely  to  recur  at  any  moment  when 
there  is  a  new  attempt  made  to  steal  something  else 
out  of  the  people  by  a  new  tariff  tax,  where  men 
before  a  Congressional  committee  have  not  only 


62  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

lied  down  to  their  very  boots,  with  the  watchful 
and  thoughtful  men  of  the  whole  nation,  out  of 
doors,  looking  on,  but  have  been  exposed  on  the 
spot  by  other  men,  so  that  the  falsehood  was  nailed 
on  to  them.  I  never  heard  that  these  felons  against 
truth  even  blushed,  or  that  when  they  went  home 
they  were  shunned  by  their  fellow-men  and  neigh- 
bors as  rightly  in  the  deepest  disgrace  into  which 
any  man  can  fall.  At  least,  such  was  the  ancient 
opinion  among  men,  and  I  am  slow  to  believe  that  we 
Americans  are  quite  ready  to  laugh  at  a  lie,  even 
when  it  is  against  the  public  good,  or  regard  it  as  a 
joke,  a  smart  trick,  a  mere  getting  the  better  of 
somebody  else.  A  lie  is  a  lie,  whether  spoken  by  a 
senator,  an  iron  manufacturer,  or  a  lobbyist  with 
the  bribe  in  his  pocket  for  which  he  does  his  dirty 
work.  Of  course  a  lie  is  the  natural  shield  of  a 
steal,  since  no  people  will  submit  to  be  robbed  un- 
less you  can  persuade  them  somehow  that  they  are 
not,  even  when  you  have  the  stolen  property  in 
your  own  pocket.  Knaves  flourish  best  in  the  soci- 
ety of  fools.  Their  silliness  tempts  the  other  fellows 
to  their  baseness.  The  defence  of  the  American 
people  against  the  schemes  of  the  tariff  plunderers 
is  the  intelligence  of  the  people  leading  them  to 
study  the  whole  tariff  question.  That  is  what  I  am 
trying  to  help  you  do.  I  put  my  character  behind 
my  statement  every  time,  and  you  are  to  judge  for 
yourselves  what  is  just  and  true.  I  am  sorry  to  say 
that  falsehood  is  not  confined  to  any  class  of  men, 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS    TAXES.  63 

not  even  to  the  tariff  lobbyists  at  Washington.  But 
I  ask  you  to  notice  that  a  good  case  needs  only  to 
have  the  truth  told  ;  and  a  bad  case,  if  it  be  argued, 
must  shun  the  truth  as  its  deadliest  foe.  That 
lawyer  is  not  wise  who  compromises  his  just  cause 
by  unjust  argument,  but  he  is  wise  who  simply 
sticks  to  and  argues  the  facts  which  make  his  cause. 
The  lawyer  with  a  bad  cause  has,  from  the  very  bad- 
ness, no  valid  reasons.  He  must  either  invent  some, 
talk  about  something  other  than  the  case  itself,  and, 
perhaps,  as  a  last  resort,  abuse  the  opposing  counsel. 
In  any  case  an  intelligent  court  or  jury  seldom  fail  to 
find  against  him.  Now  I  wish  to  say  that  the  Amer- 
ican tariff,  that  protection,  so  called,  has  no  reason, 
no  right  to  exist.  The  reasons  are  all  against  both. 
They  are  all  on  the  side  of  free  trade,  as  I  have 
explained  that  term.  I  ask  you,  therefore,  to  see 
that  the  temptation,  at  least,  to  misrepresent,  is  riot 
on  our  side.  The  facts  are  good  enough  for  us. 
Now  I  insist  upon  it,  I  will  allow  no  man  to  force 
me  from  it,  that  the  great  masses  of  the  Republican 
party  are  quite  as  honest  in  their  protection  doctrine 
as  men  can  be.  They  vote  as  they  believe.  As  a 
Democrat,  I  believe  in  the  people,  in  their  honest 
love  of  their  country.  As  a  student  of  American 
history,  I  maintain  against  any  man,  that  the 
history  of  this  nation  proves  that  the  nation  has 
been  maintained  and  honored,  more  by  the  persis- 
tent and  'instinctive'  loyalty  of  the  people,  than  by 
the  ability  and  honor  of  their  leaders.  I  do  not 


G4  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

think  that  the  present  is  any  exception  to  that 
rule." 

At  this  point  Henry  Farmer  had  something  to  say. 

"Now  this,  squire,  is  all-fired  too  bad.  What's 
the  matter  with  this  here  country?  Ain't  it  the  big- 
gest country  on  airth  ?  " 

"And  you  think,  perhaps,  that  this  tariff  made  it 
so." 

"  In  course  I  do.     What  else  did  it?  " 

"Well,  now,  Farmer,"  said  the  squire,  with  a 
laugh,  "what  you  say  reminds  me  of  what  I  saw 
once  among  the  Indians  out  West.  The  agent  on 
their  reservation  explained  to  them,  as  well  as  he 
could,  that  the  moon  was  going  to  be  black  in  the 
face  that  evening,  in  short,  there  was  going  to  be  an 
eclipse.  They  understood  by  such  an  eclipse  that 
the  Evil  Spirit  would  swallow  the  moon,  and  it  was 
their  business,  as  good  Indians,  to  get  it  out  of  his 
stomach.  So  towards  night  the  whole  tribe,  medi- 
cine-men, chiefs,  women  and  children,  dogs  and 
ponies,  turned  out  before  their  wigwams,  the  human 
part  in  paint  and  feathers,  with  war  drums  and 
rifles,  and  when,  sure  enough,  the  moon  passed  into 
eclipse,  the  whole  tribe  raised  an  infernal  hubbub  of 
guns,  tomtoms,  and  all  sorts  of  savage  cries,  loud 
enough  to  raise  the  dead.  This  was  kept  up  until 
the  eclipse  passed  off;  and  then  they  all  subsided, 
thinking  they  had  saved  the  moon.  Now  this 
American  tariff  has  no  more  to  do  in  creating  the 
prosperity  of  the  United  States  than  the  cries  of 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  65 

these  savages  had  in  ending  that  eclipse  of  the  moon. 
This  country  is  so  big,  not  because  of  the  tariff,  but 
in  spite  of  it.  -The  country  would  have  been  much 
bigger  if  this  tariff  had  been  very  much  smaller. 
Why  not  say  that  free  trade  between  the  States  is 
the  cause?  If  the  tariff  has  made  this  Republic  great, 
why  haven't  their  tariffs  made  Mexico  and  the  South 
American  republics  great  ?  How  does  it  happen  that 
this  nation,  big  as  it  has  grown,  for  more  than  sixty 
years  of  its  existence  of  about  a  century,  has  lived 
under  tariffs  vastly  lower  than  this  one  is,  and  that 
a  fair  examination  of  the  record  shows  that  the 
country  has  grown  faster  under  its  low  tariffs 
than  under  its  high  ones?  If  this  land  were  the 
Desert  of  Sahara,  would  any  tariff  or  free  trade 
under  the  sun  make  it  great?  Or  if  we  Americans 
were  Patagonian  Indians,  would  a  tariff  make  us 
big  ?  I  know  very  well  how  great  this  land  is ;  a 
land  that  has  now  sixty  millions  of  people  and  can 
support  a  thousand  millions ;  this  land  which  holds 
under  ground  exhaustless  stores  of  all  metals  and 
minerals  necessary  to  create  and  perpetuate  those 
gigantic  industries  which  employ  and  enrich  the 
world;  which  shows  a  surface  so  diversified  and 
rich,  and  so  vast  withal,  that  its  corn  and  oil  and 
wine  can  feed  the  civilized  world  if  not  a  bushel  of 
wheat  were  raised  in  Europe ;  with  a  climate  so 
diversified  that  here  we  raise  both  ice  and  oranges ; 
wines  of  the  West;  apples  of  the  East;  a  land  of 
mighty  rivers,  inland  seas,  and  seaports  fretting  its 


66  WHAT'S   THE   MATTER? 

coasts  to  invite  and  assist  commerce  among  ourselves 
and  with  all  mankind;  a  land  so  vast  that  you  can 
hide  European  empires  in  the  corner  of  a  single 
State  like  Texas ;  with  territories  not  twenty  years 
of  age,  not  even  yet  come  to  statehood,  where  more 
wheat  is  raised  in  a  year  than  France,  with  its 
almost  thousand  ages,  produces  ;  a  land  created  to 
be  great,  which  you  can  neither  rob  into  poverty 
with  tariff  laws  nor  degrade  with  a  thousand  chains 
bound  on  its  industries.  Yes,  I  am  proud  of  such  a 
land ;  but  I  am  ashamed  of  this  tariff  and  of  those 
who,  in  their  ignorance,  submit  to  it.  Yes,  and  I 
am  proud  of  our  people — a  people  whose  blood  is 
mixed  with  the  dominant  races  of  Christendom ; 
and  yet  preserving  its  identity  as  of  the  freest  and 
most  masterful  race  in  modern  history,  the  race  that 
has  colonized  into  greatness  India,  Canada,  Aus- 
tralia, the  United  States,  and  the  isles  of  the  sea,  the 
race  which  gets  what  it  wants  and  holds  \vhat  it  gets. 
It  is  the  land  and  the  men  here  which  have  made  the 
greatness,  not  the  tariff  as  the  protectionists  would 
have  us  believe.  And  just  exactly  as  I  am  proud  of 
our  native  land,  so  I  despise  all  this  protection  busi- 
ness when,  like  a  hulking  schoolboy  in  the  dark, 
cowering  before  the  echo  of  his  own  voice  as  he 
passes  by  a  graveyard,  thinking  he  hears  a  ghost,  it 
stands  before  the  world  at  Washington,  cringing 
before  the  pauper  labor  of  Europe,  taxed  almost 
under  ground  by  standing  armies,  greedy  work-mas- 
ters, with  privileged  classes  on  its  back  as  burdens, 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  67 

with  its  own  ignorance  and  hunger,  and  a  thousand 
years  of  serfdom,  unmanning  its  brain  and  arm,  having 
lost  hope  of  everything  except  its  black  bread  and 
soup,  and  asks  you  to  protect  us  all  by  tariff  taxes 
from  perishing  before  their  industrial  prowess.  Bah  ! 
I  say  it  is  unworthy  of  us  Americans.  The  only 
pauper  labor  we  have  to  fear  is  the  pauper  labor  of 
the  protectionist  politicians  at  Washington.  They 
are  the  paupers,  I  mean  poor  and  mean-spirited  peo- 
ple, who  affront  our  self-respect  every  time  they 
tell  us  that  American  industries  cannot  protect 
themselves.  The  American  is  not  used  to  stand  cap 
in  hand  in  the  forum  of  the  world,  asking  somebody 
to  give  him  a  cent.  It  is  his  habit,  when  he  w^ants  a 
thing,  to  reach  out  his  right  hand  and  grasp  it  by 
honest  toil.  But  he  must  have  a  free  hand,  and  is  a 
rather  dangerous  man  to  handcuff  when  once  he 
feels  the  iron  pinching  his  wrists.  Cringing,  hat  in 
hand,  to  government  for  an  alms,  is  a  habit  of  protec- 
tion. The  proudest  aristocracy  of  Europe,  I  mean  the 
English,  in  the  'Corn  Laws'  struggle  between  them 
and  the  English  people  asking  free  bread,  were 
forever  coming  to  the  British  Parliament  asking  for 
the  people's  taxes  which  were  their  profits  as  land- 
lords of  the  soil,  until  one  of  the  proudest  of  them, 
Sidney  Herbert,  in  the  House  of  Commons  was 
forced  to  say  that  he  was  sick  of  this  eternal  cring- 
ing for  protection,  and  the  shaft  of  his  sarcasm  went 
home  both  to  lords  and  commons.  No  !  to  end  this 
matter,  I  say  that  God  made  this  country  great  that 


68  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER  f 

its  people  might  also  be  great  and  happy.  Protec- 
tionists say  the  tariff  did  it.  I  am  not  surprised 
that  a  system  which  steals  away  the  rights  of  the 
people  should  try  to  convey  away  into  its  own  mis- 
erable shambles  the  glory  which  belongs  only  to  God. 
The  United  States  no  more  need  'protection' 
than  would  a  prize-fighter  in  a  -Quaker  meeting- 
house. 

"Now,  then,  to  my  point, — to  attempt  to  prove 
that  protection  does  not  protect ;  that  is,  that  it  has 
not  helped  or  maintained  our  home  market.  I  take 
first  the  confession  of  the  manufacturers  themselves. 
Whenever  there  is  any  proposed  change  in  the  tariff 
they  all  come  with  this  lament  in  their  mouths,  as  did 
a  few  years  ago  the  American  Iron  and  Steel  Asso- 
ciation, representing  the  iron  trade,  which  lies  at  the 
root  of  all  business  :  'With  failure  upon  failure  of  our 
most  experienced  and  respected  iron  masters  an- 
nounced in  the  public  prints  from  day  to  day,  with 
wages  of  iron  workers  necessarily  reduced  so  low 
that  they  and  their  families  can  scarcely  escape  desti- 
tution and  starvation,  we  are  astounded  to  learn  that 
a  reduction  of  duties  on  foreign  iron  is  seriously  con- 
templated, and  we  protest  against  such  action.'  There 
had  been  almost  no  end  to  this  kind  of  confession 
from  the  manufacturers.  Now,  I  know  that  these 
men  —  not  paupers,  but  millionnaires  —  cry  'baby' 
more  than  there  is  need  whenever  their  pockets  are 
going  to  be  touched  by  giving  the  consumers  of  this 
nation  a  little  relief  from  the  pack  of  tariff  taxes  on 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  69 

their  backs,  and  that  anything  they  say  must  be 
taken  with  a  big  pinch  of  allowance ;  but  since  what 
they  say  is  confirmed  by  the  experience  of  eveiy 
man  who  has  kept  his  eyes  open  for  the  last  twenty- 
five  years,  we  may  conclude  that  when  they  confess 
that  the  tariff  has  failed  to  protect  the  home  market, 
and  that  the  taxes  we  paid  them  to  carry  on  business 
were  a  dead  loss  to  us,  instead  of  the  profit  they 
promised  we  should  get,  they  are  correct.  The  Re- 
publican Tariff  Commission  of  1882  recommended  an 
average  reduction  in  tariff  taxes  of  about  20  per  cent, 
which  was  another  confession  that  the  tariff  as  it 
stood  then  (and  it  is  the  same  to-day)  was  either 
unnecessary  or  injurious  to  our  industries.1  But  here 
are  some  figures  that  I  hope  will  mean  something  to 
you. 

"The  United  States  have  now,  according  to  the  best 
estimates,  about  60,000,000  of  people.  The  census 
of  1880  showed  that  then  there  were  17,000,000  en- 
gaged in  industries ;  that  7,000,000  of,  these  were 
employed  in  agriculture,  4,000,000  in  professional 
and  personal  services,  2,000,000  in  trade  and  trans- 
portation, and  nearly  4,000,000  in  manufactures  and 
mines.  At  least,  nigh  one-half  of  our  population 
were  dependent  on  farms.  Now,  that  they  couldn't 
protect  the  farmers,  if  they  would,  —  that  is,  raise 
the  price  of  their  products,  —  appears  from  the  fact 
that  the  prices  of  most  of  our  agricultural  products, 
like  cotton,  wheat,  corn,  pork,  etc.,  are  fixed  in  the 
free  trade  market  of  Great  Britain.  Let  prices  rise 

*  See  Report  of  Tariff  Com.  1882,  p.  5. 


70  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

or  full  in  Liverpool,  and  Chicago  must  follow  suit  at 
once.  What  do  the  farmers  get,  then,  for  all  the 
tariff  taxes  they  pay?  The  answer  is,  the  home  mar- 
ket. But  they  would  have  that  market  all  the  same 
if  there  was  not  a  dollars  tax  of  protection  on  a 
3*ard  of  cloth  or  a  ton  of  iron,  unless  we  admit,  with 
the  protectionist,  that  without  our  tariff  taxes  our 
manufactures  would  cease  to  exist.  But  all  our 
experience  has  been  just  the  other  way,  to  wit,  that 

whenever  these  taxes  have  been   taken  off,  or  even 

• 

lowered,  these  manufactures  have  taken  a  new  start 
for  the  better.  The  fact  is  that  our  home  market 
can't  take  what  our  farmers  raise,  and  so  they  sell 
their  surplus  abroad,  and  the  price  abroad  fixes  the 
price  at  home.  Our  market  takes  70  per  cent  of 
what  our  farmers  raise,  and  the  outside  world  takes 
the  other  30  per  cent.  And,  mark  you,  when  that 
30  per  cent  is  sold,  it  is  sold  3,000  miles  away,  in 
competition  with  India  wheat,  raised  by  the  poorest 
'pauper  labor '  on  the  face  of  the  globe,  and  sold,  too, 
at  a  profit.  Now,  if  our  farmers  can  sell  in  competi- 
tion with  such  labor,  why  can't  our  mechanics?  And, 
furthermore,  I  think  that  if  the  30,000,000  of  our 
agricultural  population  were  not  the  meekest  and 
most  long-suffering  of  mortals,  they  would  speak  at 
the  ballot-box  loud  enough  for  Congress  to  hear; 
and  what  they  would  say  would  amount  to  this: 
4  We  are  also  American  citizens,  though  your  tariff 
laws  have  disfranchised  us,  and  deprived  us  of  our 
equal  rights,  and  taken  toll  of  us  for  our  neighbor's 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  71 

grist.  We  have  taken  the  bran  of  protection  long 
enough.  Now  we  must  have  a  little  wheat  at  the 
hands  of  this  great  and  glorious  Republic.  We  want 
to  be  rid  of  the  tariff,  and  we  give  you  notice  that 
henceforth  the  laws  of  the  United  States  must  recog- 
nize the  fact  that  there  are  farmers,  as  well  as  manu- 
facturers, here.' 

"Now  look  at  the  wool  manufactures,  next  in 
magnitude  to  iron.  All  other  high  tariff  nations, 
except  Spain,  have  put  wool  on  the  free  list.  Every 
country  without  exception  whose  wool  manufactures 
come  into  competition  with  ours,  enjoys  the  advan- 
tage of  free  wool.  It  was  a  big  blunder,  ensuring 
disaster,  that  we  didn't  treat  wool  in  the  same  way. 
As  things  are,  wool  is  taxed  on  an  average  45 
per  cent,  and  woollen  goods  are  protected  about  the 
same.  Now,  how  taking  a  dollar  out  of  the  manu- 
facturer's pocket  by  taxed  wool  and  putting  a  dollar 
into  his  other  pocket  by  a  protective  tax  on  his 
goods,  helps  make  him  better  off,  is  past  my  finding 
out.  If  it  does,  the  fact  knocks  addition  and  sub- 
traction into  a  cocked  hat.  We  have  had  high 
taxes  on  wool  and  woollens  for  the  last  twenty-five 
years.  Our  wool  manufacturers,  as  a  rule,  have 
made  no  money,  and  trade  for  them  has  in  general 
been  so  bad  that  when  a  woollen  mill  is  burnt  down 
it  is  seldom  rebuilt,  as  though  fire  were  a  mercy  in 
comparison  with  the  wool  tariff,  especially  if  the 
mill  was  insured.  And  how  about  the  sheep  and  the 
farmers?  Under  this  tariff,  sheep  have  decreased  in 


72  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

every  State  east  of  the  Mississippi  and  in  many 
west.  All  that  we  can  say  of  the  vanished  sheep  in 
several  eastern  States  is  that  'Mary  had  a  little 
lamb.'  I  know  that  all  this  decay  of  sheep-raising  is 
not  due  to  the  tariff,  but  all  this  has  happened  under 
the  tariff ;  and  my  point  is  that  this  tariff  has  pro- 
tected neither  the  sheep  nor  their  owners.  Sheep- 
raising  has  gone  West  just  as  wheat-raising  in  New 
England  has  gone  West,  and  nobody  can  stop  it 
unless  you  tax  western  sheep  to  keep  them  from 
competing  with  eastern  sheep  ;  and  that  many  folks 
would  like  to  do  if  the  law  of  the  land  did  not  stand 
in  the  wa}r.  And  what  has  come  and  is  coming  to 
the  wool  growers  in  the  far  West  and  Texas?  Low 
prices.  Why  ?  Listen.  We  use  about  six  hundred 
millions  of  pounds  of  wool  yearly  in  our  factories. 
We  raise  about  half  that  amount  here.  The  other 
three  hundred  millions  of  pounds  we  must  import 
anyhow.  But  when  we  import  it  and  it  has  gone 
into  cloth,  the  tax  makes  it  so  dear  that  we  can 
hardty  sell  a  yard  of  cloth  in  the  world's  markets  be- 
cause the  free  wool  of  England,  France,  Belgium  and 
Germany  can  be  sold  cheaper.1  Take  high-priced 
broadcloths,  for  instance.  They  can't  be  made  any- 
where unless  a  certain  kind  of  Australian  wool  goes 
into  them.  Not  one  pound  of  that  wool  is  or  can  be 
raised  in  the  United  States.  Now,  if  we  had  this 
foreign  wool  free,  we  could  take  and  mix  it  with 
Ohio  wool,  increasing  the  demand,  and  so  the  price 
for  that  wool,  and  sell  at  home  and  abroad;  As  the 

:  See  note,  p.  233, 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  73 

tariff  now  is,  it  substantially  excludes  the  high- 
priced  Australian  wool,  and  so  our  manufacturers 
can't  use  it,  and  the  foreigner  sends,  at  least,  forty 
million  dollars'  worth  of  broadcloths  every  year 
into  this  market  and  we  buy  it.  All  this,  we  are 
told,  is  to  protect  American  industry  and  American 
labor.  The  woollen  manufacturers  don't  believe  it. 
They  have  found  out  the  folly  of  it,  and  they  want 
free  wool.  They  can't  get  it  because  the  wool 
growers  say  if  they  do,  the  tariff  shall  come  off 
every  yard  of  woollen  goods,  and  show  a  tremendous 
set  of  teeth.  If  it  did,  in  my  judgment  it  would 
make  this  land  richer,  all  wool  growers  included,  and 
make  us  masters  of  the  woollen  industries  of  the 
world.  What  do  the  wool  growers  propose?  Why, 
to  raise  the  tariff  on  wool  still  higher.  But  that 
would  destroy  the  manufacturer,  unless  he  got  a 
higher  tariff  tax  on  his  goods.  '  Give  him  the  higher 
tax  then,'  say  the  growers,  which  is  very  much  like 
saying  that  a  man  drunk  on  wine  should  have  a  stiff 
glass  of  brandy  to  make  him  sober.  Indeed  the 
attitude  of  the  wool  men  and  the  woollen  cloth  men 
to  each  other,  furnishes  the  high  comedy  in  this 
wholly  miserable  tariff  business.  When  anybody 
speaks  out  in  meeting  suggesting  lower  taxes,  they 
all  cry  out  in  chorus,  '  Let  alone  this  blessed  tariff. 
Whoever  touches  it  is  an  enemy  to  labor,  to  liberty, 
to  America  —  is  a  free  trader.'  But  when  they  get  by 
the  ears  over  the  division  of  the  spoils,  which  of  late 
years  have  grown  lean  enough,  heaven  knows,  they 


74  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

look  to  me  very  much  like  a  pack  of  men  with  hammers, 
standing  over  this  same  blessed  tariff  and  threatening 
one  the  other.  c  If  you  smash  my  share  I'll  smash 
yours;'  and  between  them  all,  if  the  first  blow  were 
struck,  this  puff-ball  of  the  woollen  tariff  \vould  go 
up  in  smoke  by  the  hands  of  its  own  friends. 

"  This  woollen  tariff  shows  its  handiwork  against 
our  American  industries,-  its  truly  destructive  and  in 
no  wise  protective  character,  in  its  destruction  of  our 
woollen  exports ;  and  this  too  at  a  time  when  all 
civilized  nations  are  struggling  with  each  other  and  us 
to  export  these  surplus  manufactures.  Take  a  few  ex- 
amples as  they  come  along.  In  1870  we  produced 
$21,000,000  of  carpets ;  we  exported  $6,000,  and  of 
these  exported  carpets,  $5,000  went  to  Canada,  our 
next  door  neighbor.  In  1876  we  manufactured 
$134,000,000  of  woollen  goods ;  we  exported  about 
$700,000,  or  about  one-half  of  one  per  cent. 

"  Let  us  see  what  the  wholesale  taxes  on  iron  and 
steel,  direct  and  indirect,  cost  our  people  who  con- 
sume the  same  at  home.  The  figures  are  by  the 
general  manager  of  the  American  Iron  and  Steel  Asso- 
ciation—  a  strong  protectionist  phalanx  of  money- 
makers—and reach  to  1888.  From  1878  to  1887 
it  cost  the  consumers  of  iron  and  steel  in  the  United 
States  $560,000,000  more  than  it  cost  the  English 
consumers  for  the  like  goods,  or  $56,000,000  more 
per  annum.  In  1887,  when  we  had  our  largest  out- 
put, it  cost  us  $80,000,000  more.  In  that  year  our 
Government  received  as  duties  on  all  steel  and  iron 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  75 

importations  $20,700,000,  or  less  than  one-fifth  of 
$103,471,097,  our  surplus  or  unneeded  revenue  of  that 
year.  There  remained,  therefore,  $60,000,000  of 
indirect  taxation  of  which  the  Washington  treasury 
received  nothing  which  must  have  been  paid  by  our 
consumers  of  steel  and  iron.  But  into  whose  pockets 
did  this  money  go  ?  Into  the  pockets  of  the  men 
engaged  in  the  iron  and  steel  business.  I  don't  deny 
that  they  paid  out  a  deal  of  it  into  the  hands  of  the 
railroads  and  workmen  who  helped  them  carry  on 
business.  But  out  of  sixty  millions  a  big  pile  re- 
mained for  themselves.  In  other  words,  the  national 
treasury  got  one-fourth,  and  somebody  else  about 
three-fourths.  Protection  in  this  case  paid  some- 
body and  somebody  paid.  Another  little  straw : 
according  to  the  census  of  1880  the  entire  capital 
invested  in  the  iron  industry  of  the  United  States, 
including  iron  and  coal  mines  and  the  manufacture 
of  coke  to  make  iron,  could  not  have  been  more 
than  $341,000,000.1  The  price  therefore  paid  by 
the  consumers  of  iron  and  steel  in  the  United 
States  to  help  carry  on  the  iron  furi^ces  and  rolling 
mills  of  the  country  for  ten  years,  when  wages  were 
less,  on  the  average,  than  those  paid  to  outside  labor, 
has  been  about  sixty-live  per  cent  more  than  the 
entire  capital  invested.  Who  paid  this  huge  bill? 
The  people.  What  did  they  get  in  return?  I  leave 
them  to  search  their  own  pocket-books  and  see.  I 
only  know  that  $560,000,000  did  not  come  clown 
from  the  sun  in  some  celestial  money  spout,  and  I 

1  See  note,  p.  235. 


76  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

guess,  as  a  Yankee,  that  somebody  who  looks  very 
much  like  you  and  me  footed  the  bills. 

"  Let  me  dip  a  few  taxes  out  of  the  great  sea 
which  is  smothering  us  all,  and  see  whether  they 
taste  salt  or  not.  On  every  dollar  you  spend  for  any 
one  of  the  following  tilings,  the  tariff  takes  from  you 
these  amounts,  computed  in  cents,  viz. :  men's  suits, 
of  wool,  48  cents ;  woollen  hosiery  and  undershirts, 
75  cents ;  cotton  hosier}7  and  undershirts,  45  cents ; 
woollen  hats  and  caps,  75  cents  ;  a  silk  dress,  50  cents ; 
gloves,  60  cents;  blankets,  60  cents  ;  alpaca  dresses, 
63  cents;  scissors,  45  cents;  brass  pins,  30  cents; 
penknives,  50  cents ;  needles,  25  cents ;  steel  pens, 
45  cents  ;  razors,  55  cents  ;  carpets,  68  to  74  cents ; 
furniture,  35  cents ;  wall-paper,  25  cents ;  window 
curtains,  45  cents  ;  looking-glass,  60  cents. 

"In  your  kitchen  on  every  dollar's  worth  as  fol- 
lows: iron  stove,  45  cents;  pots  and  kettles,  58 
cents;  copper  and  brass  utensils,  45  cents;  crock- 
ery, 55  cents ;  glassware,  45  cents ;  table  cutlery  and 
spoons,  45  cents  ;  pickled  and  salt  fish,  25  cents  ; 
salt,  36  cents;  sugar,  48  cents ;  oranges  and  other 
fruits,  10  cents  ;  rice,  $1.23  cents. 

"  That  is,  if  your  woollen  suit  costs  you  $10,  $4.80  of 
that  cost  is  a  tariff  tax  for  protection,  and  so  on  with 
eacli  article  in  these  tables.  But  all  the  men  not  in 
manufactures,  and  women  too,  the  farmer,  the  law- 
yer, the  preacher,  the  physician  and  laboring 
woman,  wear  clothes  and  have  kitchens,  or  at  least 
help  pay  somehow  for  the  kitchens,  and  where  does 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  77 

their  protection  come  in  ?  Does  it  come  ?  Has  it 
come?  Can  it  come  under  this  tariff?  I  say  No. 
Protection  says  Yes,  it  comes  because  we  keep  you  all 
going.  Let  the  manufacturers  drop  out  and  the  whole 
country  goes  to  the  dogs.  But  would  the  manufac- 
turers under  a  much  lower  tariff  drop  out  ?  I  say  No, 
and  my  reason  is  that  the  fact  has  been  that  wherever 
and  whenever  we  have  had  free  raw  material,  and  in 
proportion  as  we  have  had  it,  in  wool,  leather,  or 
anything  else,  business  has  prospered. 

"Nor  is  this  all.  There  is  a  very  mean  streak 
running  through  this  tariff  which  consists  in  taxes 
laid  on  the  poor  and  taken  off  the  rich,  in  other 
words,  taxed  necessaries  and  free  or  almost  free 
luxuries.  Here  are  a  few  items  in  proof. 

"  Ottar  of  roses,  free;  castor  oil,  180  per  cent; 
orange  flower  oil,  free;  linseed  oil,  62  per  cent; 
diamonds,  10  per  cent :  common  window  glass,  87 
per  cent;  raw  silk,  free;  raw  wool,  45  per  cent; 
jewelry,  25  per  cent ;  steel  rails,  85  per  cent ;  gold 
studs,  25  per  cent ;  horse-shoe  nails,  116  per  cent ; 
fine  wines,  29  per  cent ;  cheap  woollen  goods,  77  per 
cent ;  thread  lace,  30  per  cent ;  spool  thread,  51  per 
cent;  fine  carpets,  46  per  cent;  common  druggets, 
86  per  cent;  India  shawls,  40£  per  cent;  common 
woollen  shawls,  86  per  cent ;  silk  stockings,  50  per 
cent;  common  worsted  stockings,  73  per  cent;  fine 
broadcloth,  41  per  cent-;  common  cloth,  89  per  cent; 
pate  de  foie  gras,  25  per  cent;  galvanized  wire,  used 
in  ten  thousand  ways  by  the  people,  from  132  to  155 


78  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

per  cent ;  a  bottle  of  champagne,  costing  abroad  one 
dollar,  58  cents ;  a  dollar's  worth  of  bleached  cotton 
fabric,  663-  cents;  curry  powder,  olives,  free;  pota- 
toes, 15  cents  per  bushel ;  cornstarch,  85£  per  cent 
duty  ;  salt,  85  per  cent. 

"  Now,  just  examine  these  statistics,  and  what  do 
they  show?  They  show  that  the  common  people  of 
this  country  had  no  lobby,  money,  nor  a  majority  of 
congressmen  at  Washington  to  look  after  their  inter- 
ests, while  the  richer  classes,  and  especially  the 
manufacturers,  had  ;  and  that  these  latter  both  forgot 
the  people  and  took  good  care  to  remember  them- 
selves. They  were  rich  enough  to  have  been  fair 
with  the  people,  and  they  played  foul.  For  these 
statistics  show  only  a  part  of  the  wrong.  The 
classes  who  made  this  tariff  never  showed  baser  than 
when  they  concealed  a  great  wrong  done  to  the 
masses  under  the  harmless  tariff  phrases,  a'  specific' 
tax,  and  an  fc  ad  valorem  '  tax.  A  '  specific  '  tax  or 
duty  is  so  much  on  the  pound,  yard,  gallon,  barrel, 
bushel,  etc.  An  '  ad  valorem  '  duty  is  so  much  on 
the  dollar's  worth.  A  specific  duty  on  cloth,  for 
instance,  is  so  much,  whether  it  be  a  fine  cloth  at 
five  dollars  a  yard  or  a  cloth  at  fifty  cents  a  yard. 
This  way  the  laborer  pays  as  much  tax  for  his  poor 
cloth  as  the  rich  man  does  for  his  good  cloth,  while 
the  Government,  if  it  had  an  ad  valorem  duty,  would 
have  made  each  man  pay  a  per  cent  according  to  the 
value  of  his  purchase.  Who  lose  by  this  trick  ?  The 
masses  and  the  national  treasury.  It  pays  to  be  a 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  79 

tariff  man,  especially  if  you  can  make  the  tariff 
schedules.  They  probably  did  all  this  on  the  basis  of 
a  maxim  attributed  to  Colbert,  the  famous  financial 
minister  of  Louis  XIV.,  that  the  perfection  of  taxa- 
tion consists  in  so  plucking  the  goose,  i.e.  the  peo- 
ple, as  to  procure  'the  greatest  amount  of  feathers 
with  the  least  possible  amount  of  squawking.' 

"Again  :  we  are  producing  some  $24,000,000  worth 
of  hats  and  caps  and  importing  less  than  $20,000 
worth,  so  that  we  have  our  home  market  to  ourselves. 
Yet  we  exported,  in  1876,  only  about  $200,000,  and 
the  hat  arid  cap  business  for  years  has  been  in  a  bad 
way,  both  for  manufacturers  and  their  workmen. 
What's  the  matter  ?  Merely  that  the  tariff  taxes  on 
everything  which  goes  into  hats  and  caps,  from  34 
to  75  per  cent  (75  per  cent  duty  on  the  very  sewing 
thread  )  have  buried  this  industry  under  its  burdens. 
Take  the  clothing  industry,  which  now  produces 
nearly  $300,000,000.  We  export  a  few  hundred 
thousands  only.  Why?  Because  the  taxes  bury 
the  clothing  industry.  Yet  they  say  that  we  are  the 
best-dressed  people  in  the  world.  Perhaps  we  are, 
for  we  are  the  most  industrious  people  in  the  world. 
They  say  that  we  are  the  cheapest-dressed  people. 
In  one  sense  we  may  be.  Shoddy  cloth  made  out  of 
•old  rags  and  ground  over  and  over  again  in  the  mills, 
and  worn  over  and  over  again  by  the  people,  is  not 
dear  in  price  but  very  dear  in  use,  as  the  new  coat, 
like  a  pasteboard  shoe,  soon  in  rags,  teaches  many  a 
father  clothing  his  family.  Examine  the  boys'  and 


80  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

girls'  clothes  as  they  are  gathered  in  their  Sunday- 
school  and  you  will  find  that  these  clothes  are  stuffed 
and  running  over  either  with  shoddy  or  Carolina  cot- 
ton put  in  for  wool.  When  wool  goes  up  the  cloth- 
man  makes  more  cotton  go  in.  And  that  is  one 
curse  of  high  prices  made  by  a  tariff.  Almost  every- 
thing we  wear  is  adulterated,  mocking  poor  quality 
with  a  cheap  price.  I  don't  believe  there  is  an  all- 
wool  blanket  in  this  whole  town.  I  don't  believe 
that  any  man  of  you,  in  his  6  go-to-meeting  suit,' 
next  Sunday,  will  wear  on  him  a  single  all-wool 
article.  I  say  again  that  this  protection  business 
robs  a  man  down  to  his  undershirt  and  his  baby's 
blanket." 

"But  wouldn't  it  be  as  bad  under  free  trade?" 
interposed  an  elderly  man,  who  had  been  proposing 
in  his  own  mind  to  give  his  latest  grand-baby  a  new 
cradle  blanket  at  Christmas.  "  People  have  queer 
ways  nowadays,  squire." 

"  No ;  and  for  this  reason.  Cheap  raw  material 
takes  away  a  great  temptation  and  almost  necessity 
to  deal  foul,  and  a  man's  competitors  have  always 
a  tendency  to  keep  a  wholesale  cheat  within  some 
sort  of  bounds.  The  buyers'  care  and  intelligence 
must  be  left  to  take  charge  of  the  rest.  I  will  leave 
off  here,  men,  and  to-morrow  night,  if  you  like,  I 
will  go  on." 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  81 


CHAPTER   V. 

AT  the  next  meeting,  Mr.  Freeman  began:  — "Adam 
Smith,  the  founder  of  political  economy  in  England, 
said  a  hundred  years  ago,  'When  manufacturers 
meet  it  may  be  expected  that  a  conspiracy  will  be 
planned  against  the  pockets  of  the  public.'  Let  me 
first  show* you,  then,  the  tariff  taxes  under  which  this 
nation  staggers  —  how  far  the  conspiracy  has  gone. 

"But  first  let  me  tell  you  that  this  same  tariff,  so 
far  as  it  has  any  item  of  protection  in  it,  has  already 
been  declared  unconstitutional  and  a  robbery  by  no 
less  an  authority  than  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United 
States.  (Loan  Association  v.  Topeka,  20  Wallace, 
pp.  655-668.)  Here  is  the  record.  In  1872  the  legis- 
lature of  Kansas  passed  a  law  authorizing  counties 
and  towns  4  to  encourage  the  establishment  of  manu- 
factories and  such  other  enterprises  as  may  tend  to 
develop'  such  county  or  city  by  the  direct  appropri- 
ation of  money  or  by  the  issue  of  bonds  to  any 
amount  that  the  local  authorities  might  consider  ex- 
pedient. Under  this  State  law  the  city  of  Topeka 
issued  its  bonds  to  the  extent  of  one  hundred  thou- 
sand dollars,  — '  a  majority  of  its  citizens  assenting,'  - 
and  gave  these  bonds  as  a  donation  to  an  iron-bridge 
company  for  establishing  and  operating  their  shops 


82  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

in  that  city.  The  first  interest  coupons  were  paid. 
But  when  the  second  became  due  the  city  of  Topeka 
refused  payment  on  the  ground  that  the  legislature 
of  Kansas  had  no  right,  under  the  State  constitution, 
to  make  any  such  law.  Legal  proceedings  were  had 
to  force  payment  in  the  United  States  Circuit  Court, 
and  judgment  there  having  been  given  for  the  city, 
an  appeal  was  taken  to  the  United  States  Supreme 
Court,  where,  with  but  one  dissenting  judge,  the 
judgment  of  the  lower  court  was  affirmed  and  the 
decision  therefore  now  stands  as  the  law  of  the  land. 
I  will  make  only  two  extracts  from  that  decision, 
which  any  man  here  can  r$ad  through  for  himself  to- 
morrow, if  he  likes,  in  our  friend  Lawyer  Kambrel- 
Jing's  law  library.  The  court  says,  'To  lay  with  one 
hand  the  power  of  the  government  on  the  property 
of  the  citizen  and  with  the  other  bestow  it  upon  fav- 
ored individuals  to  aid  private  enterprises  and  build 
up  private  fortunes  is  none  the  less  robbery  because  it 
is  done  under  the  forms  of  the  law  and  is  called  tax- 
ation. This  is  not  legislation  ;  it  is  a  decree  (confis- 
cation) under  legislative  forms.  Nor  is  it  taxation. 
Beyond  a  cavil  there  can  be  no  lawful  tax  which  is 
riot  laid  for  a  public  purpose.'  The  decision  elsewhere 
says,  'No  line  can  be  drawn  in  favor  of  the  manu- 
facturer which  would  not  open  the  public  treasury 
to  the  importunities  of  two-thirds  of  the  business 
men  of  the  city  or  town.'1  As  every  man  of  intelli- 
gence can  see,  the  protection  element  in  this  tariff  is 
made  an  outlaw  by  this  decision." 

1  See  note,  p.  239. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  83 

"But  ho\v,  then,  squire,"  asked  one  of  his  auditors, 
"  can  they  keep  on  making  such  laws  at  Washington 
and  not  come  to  grief?  " 

"  Very  easily.  They  know  all  this  better  than 
you  and  I  do,  and  therefore  no  tariff  bill  ever  uses 
the  word 'protection.'  It  is  always  apparently  for 
revenue  only,  as  the  Constitution  directs  and  as  the 
Democratic  party  holds.  There  is  therefore  no 
chance  to  carry  a  tariff  case  of  this  sort  before  the 
courts.  If  they  will  put  a  protective  clause  in  any 
tariff  the  judges  have  already  declared  it  unconsti- 
tutional and  the  tariff  must  fall. 

"Now,  then,  under  the  shield  of  the  decision  of 
the  Supreme  Court,  I  am  going  to  say  that  this 
American  tariff  is  also  unnatural  —  against  the  laws 
of  Nature.  '  We  conquer  Nature,'  says  Lord  Bacon, 
'by  obeying  her,'  and  by  that  ob.edience  the  human 
race  lias  attained  to  its  present  wonderful  civiliza- 
tion. Our  tariff,  on  the  contrary,  is  a  chronic  and 
general  warfare  on  the  civilization  of  the  world,  and 
so  on  the  laws  of  nature,  whose  fruit  that  civilization 
is.  I  say  that  free  speech,  free  conscience,  free  man- 
hood, free  trade  is  by  nature  ;  and  that  all  slavery 
is  artificial,  unnatural,  and  is  always  bound  to  give 
adequate  reason  why  it  should  exist.  The  tariff 
attempts  the  impossible.  There  never  was  and 
there  never  will  be  any  commissary  department 
which  can  feed  London  half  as  well  as  London  left 
to  itself  feeds  itself  every  day.  There  never  was 
and  there  never  will  be  any  government  that  can 


84  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

regulate  its  commerce  or  its  manufactures  half  as 
well  as  they  can  regulate  themselves.  The  Ameri- 
can people  do  their  own  thinking  and  they  ought  to 
be  let  alone  to  do  their  own  trading,  where  and  as 
they  please,  with  as  little  government  interference  as 
possible,  always  remembering  that  government  must 
be  supported  by  some  sort  of  tax  —  yes,  and  by 
tariff  taxes  until  the  nation  finds  a  better  way. 
You  may  make  water  run  uphill,  but  it  costs,  and  it 
is  troublesome.  To  let  it  run  downhill  is  in  general 
better.  We  had  better  let  all  trade  take  its  natural 
course  and  take  its  natural  consequences.  The  pro- 
tection idea  is  exactly  opposite  to  all  this.  It  is 
meddlesome,  tyrannical,  and  in  the  end  disastrous  to 
everybody.  It  is  always  shutting  somebody  in  or 
somebody  out,  like  a  turnkey.  Allowed  to  reach  its 
natural  conclusions  and  it  would  'protect'  every 
man  into  solitude  and  savagery.  Here,  if  it  could, 
it  would  protect  the  people  of  one  State  against 
another  —  Eastern  wheat  against  Western;  Penn- 
sylvania pig-iron  against  Alabama  pig-iron ;  Maine 
lumber  against  Wisconsin  lumber:  Rhode-Island 
eggs  against  Massachusetts  eggs;  Connecticut  clocks 
against  Vermont  potatoes;  town  against  town  so 
that  people  on  one  side  of  a  hill  should  be  protected 
from  people  on  the  other  side.  All  this  is  done  in 
protected  Europe  and  would  be  done  here  were  it 
not  for  the  Supreme  Court.  Now,  civilization  is  only 
possible  by  co-operation  and  use  of  the  forces,  like 
machinery  and  commerce,  which  civilization  has 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  85 

evolved.  If  you  will  follow  out  this  line  of  thought 
you  will  find  that  protection  runs  counter  to  this 
great  tide  of  human  progress  —  that  it  is  mercantile 
barbarism. 

"  I  object  next  to  this  protection  business  that  it 
is  anti-American,  anti-republican,  aristocratic,  and 
the  tool  of  tyranny.  It  began  with  the  lust  and 
rage  of  kings ;  with  the  robbers  of  mediaeval  igno- 
rance; and  it  must  end  so  soon  and  in  just  that 
degree  as  men  become  free  men.  Can  you  conceive 
of  a  more  disagreeable  slavery  than  that  where  the 
law  should  say,  '  You  shall  buy  and  sell  exactly  as  I 
say.'  Yet  this  tariff  says  that  in  a  thousand  ways, 
since  it  taxes  four  thousand  articles,  I  might  say  in 
four  thousand  ways.  In  the  old  slavery  the  master 
took  all  the  wages  of  his  workmen.  In  this  white 
slavery,  the  protected  master  takes  only  a  part  of 
your  wages,  to  wit,  just  that  amount  of  money 
which  you  pay  more  for  anything  you  buy,  than 
though  there  had  been  no  tariff  tax  in  favor  of  his 
goods  and  against  your  pockets.  In  the  old  black 
slavery  it  was  said,  'the  master  distributes  floggings, 
but  he  also  distributes  rations.'  In  the  white  slav- 
ery of  the  tariff,  we  are  told  that  the  masters  dis- 
tribute taxes  among  us,  but  they  also  give  us  work. 
The  answer  is,  '  But  as  the  slave  earns  the  rations 
which  he  gets,  and  feeds  his  master  also,  so  the 
American  mechanic  earns  his  wages  and  so  far  as  he 
pays  protective  prices  feeds  his  master  also.'  I  am  as 
much  entitled  to  free  trade  as  I  am  to  free  speech  or 


86  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

free  air.  It  is  a  part  of  my  birthright  as  a  human 
being." 

uBut,  squire,"  interrupted  one  of  the  audience, 
"you  told  us  that  we  must  have  tariff  taxes  to  support 
the  government  and  that  the  consumer  must  pay 
them,  and  why  isn't  that  robbery  just  as  well." 

"  Because  you  are  always  as  much  bound  to  help, 
according  to  your  ability,  to  support  that  govern- 
ment under  which  you  live  by  some  sort  of  fair 
taxation,  direct  or  indirect,  as  you  are  to  support 
yourself  or  your  family.  The  government  exists  to 
protect  you  from  invasion,  from  robbery,  from  wrong. 
It  carries  your  letters,  coins  your  money,  is  your  agent 
to  transact  partly  your  business  where  you  cannot;  and 
you  pay  it  in  taxes  just  as  you  pay  the  shoemaker  or 
the  carpenter,  or  the  grocer  who  brings  round  your 
flour  and  sugar.  Every  man  should  pay  his  debts, 
especially  to  his  country.  But  under  our  tariff  you 
pay  money  you  don't  owe,  to  monopolists  who  work 
against  you,  not  for  you,  with  whom  you  have  made 
no  contract,  and  who  scoop  in  your  '  shekels '  with  a 
gambler's  rake  at  an  illegal  game,  which  has  man- 
aged, as  I  showed  in  the  Topeka  case,  to  evade  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States. 

"  I  object  next  to  this  tariff  business  that  it  is 
base,  cruel,  and  immoral.  It  is  immoral  because, 
while  Christianity  says  all  men  are  brothers,  protec- 
tion says  in  all  its  schedules  and  robberies  that  only 
the  robbers  are  brothers.  It  is  base  because  by  its 
very  nature  it  runs  to  tricks.  Just  read  the  story  of 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  87 

a  Massachusetts  button  manufacturer.  He  got  his 
buttons  highly  protected,  but  found  that  the  foreign 
cloth  he  used  to  cover  them  was  also  protected,  i.e. 
taxed,  and  therefore  cost  him  more,  as  happens  in 
all  such  cases.  He  therefore  ordered  his  agents 
abroad  to  slit  and  cut  this  cloth,  and  thus  got  it 
through  the  custom  house  as  4  damaged  goods '  and 
escaped  the  tax.  Then  he  invented  a  circular  gouge 
to  cut  out  pieces  just  big  enough  to  cover  a  button, 
and  the  perforated  cloth  and  button  pieces  all  came 
in  free  as  usual.  When  he  had  become  very  rich 
from  buttons,  this  patriot,  this  philanthropist,  one 
day  chanced  to  die;  but  he  had  given  a  big  hall  to 
the  town  where  he  had  made  his  money.  If  I  could 
write  an  inscription  on  it,  it  should  be,  '  Erected  by 
Mr.  Blank,  but  paid  for  by  the  American  people,  who 
bought  his  buttons.'  Take  another  instance :  when 
Chicago  was  burned  down,  Congress,  in  the  great 
distress,  proposed,  and  the  nation  applauded,  that 
Chicago  should  have  all  its  building  material  free 
of  the  tariff  taxes,  and  were  about  to  pass  a  law 
accordingly.  This,  in  itself,  was  a  confession  that 
free  trade  was  a  blessing  to  Chicago  then.  But 
what  happened  ?  The  Michigan  and  Wisconsin 
lumber  lords  took  a  palace  car  to  Washington, 
and  when  the  bill  was  passed  it  excepted  lum- 
ber. The  exception  was  worth  millions  to  the 
lumber  lords,  and  their  wives  had  more  diamonds, 
but  how  about  Chicago  and  its  toiling  masses  ? 

"  I  object,  finally,  to  protection  that  for  more  than 


88  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

a  thousand  years  it  has  been  everywhere  merciless, 
unsparing,  cruel.  It  is  the  very  heart  of  the  thing 
to  be  so.  Lust,  whether  of  the  flesh  or  of  gain, 
grown  strong  and  dominant,  ceases  to  have  compas- 
sion for  aught  under  the  sun  that  stands  in  its  way. 
When  Queen  Elizabeth  undertook  to  encourage  the 
woollen  home  manufacture  of  England,  a  law  was 
passed  that  any  Englishman  who  exported  a  sheep 
was,  for  the  first  offence,  to  forfeit  his  goods  forever, 
to  suffer  a  year's  imprisonment,  and  then  have  his 
left  hand  cut  off  in  a  market  town  on  market  day, 
there  to  be  nailed  up  to  the  pillory.  For  the  second 
offence  he  should  be  adjudged  a  felon  and  suffer 
death.  In  the  reign  of  Charles  II.,  it  was  made  law 
that  no  person  within  fifteen  miles  of  the  sea  should 
buy  wool  without  permission  of  the  king,  nor  even 
load  wool  within  five  miles  of  the  sea,  except  be- 
tween sun  rise  and  set,  on  pain  of  forfeiture.  Par- 
liament, in  1678,  to  encourage  woollen  manufactures, 
ordered  that  every  corpse  should  be  buried  in  a 
woollen  shroud,  which  reminds  me  of  the  fact  that 
when,  a  few  }'ears  ago,  the  commercial  treaty  be- 
tween protection  France  and  Italy  came  to  an  end 
and  France  had  forbidden  Italian  fruits  and  flowers 
to  be  imported,  Italy  took  part  of  her  revenge  by 
imposing  an  import  tax  of  seventy  dollars  on  a 
French  corpse  sent  to  Milan  for  cremation,  and  then 
another  export  duty  of  seventy  dollars  when  the 
ashes  were  sent  back.  In  1672,  the  lord  chancellor 
of  England  publicly  declared  that  it  was  necessary 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS    TAXES.          89 

to  go  to  war  with  the  Dutch  to  destroy  their  com- 
merce, which  was  competing  with  England  ;  another 
English  statesman  made  the  same  declaration  in 
1743.  When  protection  England  came  out  of  the 
war  with  Louis  XIV.  victorious,  and  was  able  to 
dictate  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  Utrecht,  she  in- 
sisted that  the  great  French  port  of  Dunkirk  on  the 
Channel  should  be  filled  up  and  destroyed,  that 
French  commerce  might  not  become  too  successful, 
To  show  that  protection  loses  none  of  its  savagery 
of  temper  with  the  lapse  of  time,  it  may  be  stated 
that  a  few  years  ago  a  statesman  in  the  French 
chambers  urged  a  war  with  Tonquin  China,  on  the 
ground  that  it  would  give  employment  to  the  French 
shipping. 

a  When  one-fourth  of  'protected'  England's  people 
in  the  Corn  Law  agitation  were  starving;  when  the 
provision  dealers  sold  to  respectable  men  and  women 
the  scraps  which  before  they  had  thrown  out  as  offal ; 
when  the  mechanics  bough c  bread  by  the  halfpenny- 
worth ;  when  mothers  could  only  buy  'blue'  milk 
on  alternate  days  to  moisten  their  children's  bread; 
when  men,  wolfish  with  hunger,  prowling  for  food 
for  their  children,  or  some  frantic  woman  with  a  dead 
babe  at  her  breast,  searching  after  bread  for  her  liv- 
ing ones,  were  liable  any  day  to  break  in  upon  a 
provision  shop  and  snatch  a  bone  or  a  loaf;  in  fact, 
when  protected  England  was  about  to  perish  with 
hunger  in  a  misery  so  acute  as  was  never  seen  before 
or  since  in  Christendom  (the  Irish  misery  excepted), 


90  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

the  first  peer  of  England,  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  said, 
in  the  House  of  Lords,  that  he  had  a  sovereign 
remedy  for  these  poor  people,  viz.  :  that  if  they 
would  take  a  pinch  of  curry  powder  and  stir  it  up 
in  hot  water  and  drink  it,  they  would  find  it  a  great 
help  to  their  stomachs.  When  the  Irish  famine,  due 
to  the  potato  rot,  was  on  that,  ill-starred  land  where 
whole  generations  of  men  and  women  had  lived  and 
died  almost  without  knowing  the  taste  of  meat,  and  this 
misery  too  in  a  proud  realm  whose  sky  was  almost 
fretted  with  the  spires  of  Christian  churches,  the 
Duke  of  Cambridge  said,  like  the  man  he  was, 
'  Really,  I  can't  think  that  things  can  be  so  bad. 
We  don't  find  anything  the  matter  with  the  potatoes 
on  our  table,  you  know.'  And  yet  the  English 
aristocracy  who  owned  the  land  and  kept  out  the 
people's  bread  until  all  this  misery  came,  never  let 
go  their  grasp  on  English  flesh  and  blood  until 
Bright  and  Cobden  forced  them,  because  revolution 
stalked  behind  famine,  as  every  English  statesman 
came  to  know.  To  show  that  '  protection  '  has  lost 
none  of  its  ancient  cruelty  in  these  days,  I  refer 
to  the  well-known  fact  that  when,  in  1877,  a  hun- 
dred or  so  of  women  weavers  in  a  New- York  silk 
factory,  who  had  been  deluded  out  of  England  in 
hope  of  better  wages  hero,  told  their  employer  that 
they  couldn't  exist  on  the  wages  paid  them,  he  first 
advised  them  to  hire  a  tenement  house  and  live 
together  ,•  and  when  told  that  they  had  no  money 
to  buy  beds  and  other  furniture,  promptly  informed 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  91 

them  that  they  could  probably  get  along  without 
furniture  and  sleep  on  the  floor,  though  the  meanest 
pauper  is  provided  with  a  bed  of  straw.  (New-York 
Times,  August  17,  1877.)  " 

"But  what  are  the  arguments  in  favor  of  protec- 
tion, squire,"  asked  one  of  the  elders. 

"None  that  I  ever  heard  of;  none  that  will 
stand;  none  that  will  wash.  I  regard  the  whole 
business  as  being  like  witchcraft,  astrology,  alchemy, 
or  any  other  delusion.  The  protectionists  have  a 
mouthful  of  reasons,  for,  as  I  have  said  before, 
when  a  man  has  no  reasons  to  defend  his  case  the 
first  thing  he  does  is  to  turn  round  and  invent 
some.  Since  history  is  all  against  them,  the  protec- 
tionists betake  themselves  to  prophecy,  and  as 
prophecy  is  usually  the  foretelling  of  something 
that  never  yet  was,  and  yet  never  may  be,  it  is  a 
little  difficult  to  answer  them  except  from  history. 
They  foretell  all  sorts  of  possible  calamities  and  sor- 
rows to  every  American  industry  and  every  American 
mechanic,  entirely  passing  by  the  fact  that  whenever 
and  in  fhe  exact  proportion  that  any  one  of  our 
American  industries  has  been  free  it  has  been  pros- 
perous. Yet  they  keep  on  bringing  out  the  spooks 
and  ghosts  and  Jack-o'-lanterns  of  these  imaginary 
evils  with  which  to  frighten  the  babes  and  sucklings 
who  know  no  better.  When  a  railroad  was  first  run 
up  into  Vermont  from  the  seaboard,  plenty  of  men 
listened  to  the  twaddle  that  that  railroad,  by  carting 
freight  so  cheaply,  would  destroy  the  value  of  Ver- 


92  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

inont  horses.  When  George  Stephenson  was  build- 
ing his  railroad  across  Chat  Moss  from  Liverpool  to 
Manchester,  all  the  magpies,  crows,  and  kites  of 
English  stupidity  and  selfishness  were  clamoring 
against  his  enterprise,  alleging  that  the  engine 
smoke  would  poison  English  air;  kill  English  oaks; 
scorch  all  the  verdure  of  English  landscapes;  kill  in- 
valid persons  and  children  of  tender  age  with  the 
engine  whistle,  and  make  English  cows  and  English 
mothers  miscarry  ;  in  short,  would  destroy  England. 
The  remaining  protection  stock  in  trade,  so  far  as  I 
can  see,  are  half-truths  and  false  metaphors.  Their 
half-truths,  which  always  cut  the  throat  of  the  man 
who  uses  them,  more  than  whole  lies,  since  half- 
truths  often  mislead  the  very  man  who  uses  them, 
I  shall  speak  of  later  on.  The  other  chief  assets 
of  protection  are  a  lot  of  false  metaphors,  that  is 
to  say,  fine  phrases  which  imply  something  which 
is  not — nothing  which  is.  The  very  term  'pro- 
tection' is  one  of  these  false  metaphors.  Every 
man  wants  protection  of  the  right  kind  —  protection 
against  a  bore,  for  instance,  or  against  a  smoky 
chimney.  I  like  to  be  protected  by  woollen  blan- 
kets on  a  frosty  night  or  by  a  coat  in  the  northwest 
wind.  The  babe  likes  protection  in  its  mother's 
arms.  Everybody  likes  protection  from  anything 
that  hurts,  and  needs  no  protection  from  anything 
that  does  not  hurt.  But  to  be  protected  out  of  my 
winter  coat  or  blanket  or  cheap  sugar  or  anything  I 
need  and  have  a  right  to  have,  is  not  protection,  but 


OR,    OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  93 

destruction  of  my  happiness.  The  tariff  man  assumes, 
and,  by  his  name  of  protectionist,  evades,  the  very 
question  at  issue,  to  wit,  whether  our  protective 
tariff  be  a  curse  or  blessing.  I  have  tried  to  show 
you  that  it  is  a  curse.  Thus  they  tell  us  we  are 
6  tributary  '  to  foreign  nations,  just  as  though  being 
beaten  by  them  in  war  we  pay  tribute  to  them,  as 
France  did  of  late  years  to  Germany,  while  the  only 
tribute  these  nations  ask  of  us  is  to  trade  fair  with 
us  so  that  each  may  reap  a  profit,  as  the  very  idea  of 
all  honest  commerce  is.  The  nations  are  contribu- 
tors and  co-workers  together,  not  tribute-payers  and 
tribute-takers.  Then  they  speak  of  an  'invasion'  of 
foreign  goods  into  these  markets,  as  if  silk  and  sugar 
and  allspice  were  an  army  with  banners,  instead  of 
humble  ministers  to  cur  comfort,  which  we  may  re- 
ceive or  not  exactly  as  we  like.  Whoever  heard  of 
any  sane  man  wishing  to  be  protected  against  com- 
fort, plenty,  wealth,  and  what  exactly  he  needs  or 
wants?  Yet  this  is  exactly  the  sort  of  protection 
the  American  tariff  is  giving  ninety-nine  men  out  of 
a  hundred.  Then  they  are  fond  of  speaking  of  '  an 
inundation '  of  foreign  goods  as  if  they  were  an 
angry  river  overflowing  its  banks  and  sweeping 
away  villages  and  factories.  It  all  depends  on 
what  is  meant  by  4 inundation.'  The  inundation  of 
the  Nile,  for  instance,  creates  the  agricultural 
plenty  of  Egypt.  For  my  own  part,  I  wish 
that  this  land  was  'inundated'  with  plenty;  over- 
flowing with  what  makes  men  comfortable  and 


94  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

happy.  This,  I  have  argued,  protection  prevents; 
and  that  sort  of  prevention  which  hinders  me  from 
my  comfort  and  yours  I  take  no  stock  in,  but  call 
it  a  cruel  fraud  and  robber.  I  have  been  looking 
for  some  noisy  orator  to  use  the  simile  (a  simile  is 
sister  to  a  metaphor)  that  our  protective  tariff  is 
like  those  dykes  of  Holland  which  keep  out  the  sea 
and  protect  a  busy  and  thrifty  population  who  live 
many  feet  below  the  sea  level.  They  have  not  used 
it  because  the  simile  turns  at  once  against  them. 
For  among  the  nations  we  are  the  sea  of  commercial 
and  mechanical  ability,  striving  to  get  out  into  the 
world's  markets,  and  prevented  by  the  tariff  dyke. 
So  those  waters  rise,  choking  and  covering  our  home 
market  with  a  bad  plenty  which  lowers  wages  and 
profits.  This  is  what  Mr.  Abram  Hewitt  meant 
when  he  lately  said  that  the  American  people  must 
fry  a  while  longer  in  their  own  fat  before  they  would 
reform  the  tariff.  One  day  they  will  find  this  tariff 
fat  all  in  the  fire." 

How  long  Mr.  Freeman  might  have  gone  on  in 
this  strain  it  is  hard  to  say,  but  he  and  the  meeting 
were  both  cut  short  by  a  man  tumbling  in  upon 
them  through  the  big  foundry  door  and  crying, 
"  Fire !  Fire  in  the  old  woollen  mill.  It's  all 
afire."  It  was  Jim  Brown,  the  night  watchman 
there.  The  meeting  emptied  itself  out-of-doors  as 
fast  as  live  Yankees  do  on  such  occasions,  and 
swarmed  to  the  woollen  mill.  When  Mr.  Freeman 
arrived  he  saw  that  the  mill  was  past  saving,  and, 


OR,    OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  95 

although  nearly  every  one  wrought  sturdily  as  he 
could  and  the  men  who  wrought  least  advised  most, 
—  as  such  people  always  do,  —  the  mill  in  due  time 
burned  itself  down  in  spite  of  them,  with  a  crowd 
looking  on  which  went  home  rather  late  from  its 
smoking  embers. 


WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 


CHAPTER  VI. 

MR.  FREEMAN  found  his  audience  standing  round 
the  furnace,  busily  discussing  the  fire  of  the  night 
before. 

"Bad  business,  squire,"  said  one,  as  he  came 
among  them.  "What  with  this  foundry  closed  and 
the  woollen  mill  burned  down,  there's  a  hard  look 
for  work  this  winter  in  Rabham,  anyhow." 

"Humph!  yes,"  said  the  squire  meditatively, 
"perhaps  so.  We  must  all  take  the  bitter  with  the 
sweet.  I  hardly  know  what  my  drop  out  of  that 
fire  is  ;  probably  it  has  a  mixed  taste  —  bitter-sweet, 
as  I  am  a  small  stockholder  and  we  are  well  in- 
sured." 

"I  don't  see,  then,  but  you  are  all  right,  anyhow, 
squire,"  said  his  next  neighbor  at  the  furnace. 

"  Yes,  so  far  as  the  insurance  goes,  we  are ;    better 
than  nothing.     But  it's  a  dead  loss  to  the  country  — 
so  much  wealth,  capital,  accumulated  human  labor- 
whatever  you  call  it — gone  up  in  smoke." 

"  But  it'll  give  work  to  the  mechanics  who  do  the 
building-up  again,"  said  the  same  neighbor. 

"  Yes ;  but  if  you  look  at  things  that  way,  then 
you  must  admit  that  it  would  be  a  good  thing  for 
Rabham  labor  if  all  the  houses  well  insured  in  this 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  97 

town  were  burned  down,  especially  if  the  insurance 
were  abroad;  better  still,  if  all  the  houses  in  the 
State  were  burned  the  same  way;  and  so  if  all  the 
houses  were  gone  it  would  be  a  good  thing  for  the 
lumber  yards  and  the  men  who  build  houses.  A 
curious  way  for  a  nation  to  grow  rich,  and  a  nation 
growing  poor  means  poorer  pay  for  labor.  No ! 
Wars,  fires,  inundations,  ship yrrecka,  and  whatever 
destroys  property  without  creating  other  property 
is  a  dead  loss  to  somebody, — in  a  sense  to  every- 
body. There  are  two  kinds  of  consumption  —  a  good 
and  bad  kind.  That  is  the  good  kind  where  men 
consume  to  produce :  as  where  a  man  consumes  iron 
to  forge  a  horseshoe,  or  bread  and  meat  to  enable 
him  to  work  at  any  profitable  employment  in  creat- 
ing anything  which  is  useful  to  man.  That  is  the 
bad  kind  where  consumption  produces  nothing  use- 
ful: as  where  a  mill  is  burned  down  or  a  ship  sunk 
at  sea.  I  say  this  because  I  would  like  to  save  my 
neighbors  from  that  selfish  view  of  labor  which  looks 
only  at  its  own  narrow  and  short-lived  advantage 
which  it  gets  from  the  misfortunes  of  other  people, 
and  does  not  see  that  the  general  good  in  the  long 
run  is  the  good  of  every  one,  and  that  a  general  loss 
is  every  man's  loss.  I  had  meant  to  talk  this  evening 
about  wages.  But  if  you  like  I  don't  mind  talking 
about  the  woollen-mill  business,  and  so  give  you  an 
object-lesson  on  this  tariff,  which  I  am  trying  to  help 
you  understand." 

"  That's  all  right,"  said  several ;  "  go  on,  squire." 


98  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

"Very  well.  The  laboring  people  are  always  say- 
ing, '  We  want  work.'  They  mean  all  right,  but  they 
just  miss  the  mark  when  they  talk  that  way.  What 
they  mean  to  say,  at  least  what  they  ought  to  say, 
is,  '  We  want  a  living ; '  that  is,  useful,  profitable, 
economical  work.  There  is  bad  work  as  well  as 
good ;  work  that  don't  pay,  profit,  accumulate,  add 
anything  to  the  public  good,  and  yet  must  be 
paid  for  by  somebody,  unless  the  laborers  work  for 
nothing  and  board  themselves.  All  such  bad  work 
always  comes  to  an  end  sometime,  because  the  man, 
corporation,  or  nation  which  does  the  hiring  must  go 
bankrupt.  Let  me  suppose  a  case.  Suppose  this 
commonwealth,  when  work  was  slack,  should  divide 
the  laborers  in  every  town  into  two  equal  gangs; 
should  set  one  gang  in  the  morning  to  dig  a  trench 
along  the  roadside  and  the  other  gang  in  the  after- 
noon to  fill  it  in  again,  and  pay  every  man  a  dollar 
an  hour  out  of  the  state  treasury.  Here  would  be 
plenty  of  work  well  paid,  but  it  would  be  useless, 
wasteful,  unproductive  work.  If  this  work  went  on 
long  enough  the  State  as  paymaster  would  proceed 
to  raise  its  taxes  until  they  became  so  high  that  it 
would  sell  the  workman's  house  and  garden  plot  to 
pay  for  his  own  labor.  That  is  nature,  the  way 
things  are,  and  nobody  can  alter  or  get  round  this 
nature  of  things.  This  American  tariff  is  trying  to 
do  this  very  thing,  and  will  fail.1  All  bad — that  is, 
useless,  unnecessary,  unproductive  —  labor,  then,  is  a 
curse  to  the  community,  as  that  road  work  was,  no 

1  See  note,  p.  242, 


OR,    OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.  99 

matter  how  it  dresses  itself  up  and  parades  as  a 
blessing.  Man  must,  indeed,  earn  his  bread  in  the 
sweat  of  his  brow,  but  he  wants  as  little  sweat  and 
as  much  bread  as  possible,  and  he  ought  to  have  it. 
We  do  not  labor  for  labor's  sake,  but  for  what  labor 
brings  us  as  its  reward ;  wages,  comforts,  in  short 
what  we  need  or  desire.  I  have  stated  an  extreme 
case  in  this  road  business  where  there  is  a  total  loss 
in  results,  but  you  ought  to  be  able  to  think  out  the 
law  behind  it, — that  just  exactly  as  labor  is  useless  it 
is  labor  lost,  whether  you  try  to  raise  bananas  in  Ver- 
mont or  tea  in  Tennessee.  I  have  no  doubt  you 
could  make  your  own  shoes  or  coats  if  you  spent 
time  enough  over  the  job,  but  you  have  long  since 
found  out  that  it  is  cheaper  for  you  to  mould  pots 
and  kettles  and  exchange  your  share  of  products, 
that  is,  your  wages,  for  the  shoemakers'  and  the 
tailors'  work,  and  save  money  doing  so.  They  can 
raise  pineapples  in  South  America  and  tea  in  China 
cheaper  than  we  can,  because  there  the  sun  and  the 
air  do  most  of  the  work  with  no  pay — offer,  indeed, 
a  free  gift  to  mankind,  while  we  should  have  to  make 
our  own  sun  out  of  anthracite  coal  and  fight  against 
climate  every  day  our  crop  of  oranges  or  tea  was 
above  ground,  while  it  would  be  better  for  us  to  buy 
oranges  with  ice,  tea  with  woollen  or  cotton  goods, 
or  anything  that  we  can  make.1  •  Now  just  here 
this  protection  business  in  our  tariff  makes  war 
on  natural  law.  It  taxes  out  of  the  country  the 
gifts  which  nature  has  given  other  lands,  and  so, 
1  See  note,  p.  242. 


100  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

through  wise  exchange  of  goods,  ourselves,  and  says, 
'raise  everything  yourselves  at  home,  even  if  it  costs 
1110re '  —  that  is,  if  it  takes  more  work,  '  because  it 
gives  somebody  work.'  What  is  that  but  saying 
that  useless  work  is  good  work  ?  You  ought  to  see 
it  is  bad  work.  Men  have  a  right  to  whatever  nature 
gives  the  human  race,  the  right  to  get  with  the  least 
expense  of  labor,  that  is,  of  wages,  which  represent 
their  labor,  whatever  they  desire  to  possess.  This 
tariff  tends  to  keep  out  God's  gifts  and  God's  plenty 
from  every  man's  home.  Let  me  try  to  show  all 
this  protection  business  by  boiling  down  for  you 
a  little  satire  of  Bastiat,  whose  books  every  man 
ought  to  study,  when  he  makes  the  candle-makers 
and  gas  men  of  Paris  with  their  allied  trades  present 
a  petition  for  protection  to  the  French  Assembly,  or 
Congress,  in  order,  as  they  allege,  to  give  work  to 
Frenchmen. 

"  'We  are  subjected,'  they  say,  'to  the  intolerable 
competition  of  a  foreign  rival,  who  enjoys  such 
superior  facilities  for  the  production  of  light  that 
he  inundates  our  home  market,  reduces  prices,  and 
makes  French  labor  a  drug  in  the  market,  so  that 
the  French  market  stagnates  and  is  in  a  bad  way. 
This  base  rival,  gentlemen,  is  the  sun,  who  we 
fear  has  been  instigated  by  perfidious  England  to 
carry  on  this  industrial  war  against  us.  We  there- 
fore pray  your  honorable  body  to  pass  a  law  to 
compel  all  Frenchmen  at  once  to  shut  out  this  for- 
eign invader,  this  free-trade,  from  all  French  houses 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.        101 

by  boarding  up  all  windows,  holes,  chinks  and  cracks. 
Thus  you  will  stimulate  the  tallow-chandler's  business 
and  all  France.  Labor  will  have  plenty  to  do  and 
our  manufactures  will  bring  high  prices.  As  there 
must  be  more  tallow,  the  new  demand  will  im- 
mensely increase  the  cattle  and  sheep  business  and 
so  benefit  our  fellow-citizens,  the  farmers.  As  there 
must  be  more  oil,  this  will  quicken  the  whaling 
business  and  develop  the  French  navy.  It  will 
cause  the  increased  cultivation  of  the  olive-tree  for 
oil.  Our  waste  lands  will  soon  be  covered  with  rosin 
trees,  which  will  breed  numerous  swarms  of  bees  to 
make  France  flow  with  honey.  Then,  too,  be  pleased 
to  think  how  this  plan  will  give  steady  work  to  a 
great  army  of  mechanics,  who  will  make  the  mag- 
nificent chandeliers,  lamps,  reflectors,  and  candle- 
sticks necessary  to  light  the  houses  of  Paris  and  the 
provinces.  What  magnificence,  what  glory,  what 
prosperity  to  France !  We  feel  confident  that  you 
will  grant  our  petition,  gentlemen,  because  you  have 
already  shut  out  from  France  by  a  protective  tariff 
all  the  other  works  of  this  wicked,  unpatriotic  sun, 
such  as  Spanish  oranges,  Italian  flowers,  olives  and 
vegetables,  and  now  we  ask  you  to  protect  our  trade 
in  the  interests  of  labor  and  of  France.  What  you 
have  done  you  have  done,  you  say,  to  encourage,  to 
increase  the  demand  for  labor;  you  who  love  labor 
.so  that  you  have  had  the  courage  to  make  war  on 
the  sun.  Be  pleased  to  do  so  some  more.  Never 
pause  in  your  noble  career  to  listen  to  those  wicked 


102  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER  f 

free-traders  who  run  about  with  British  gold  in  their 
pockets,  the  price  of  their  shame  and  disloyalty  to 
France ;  but  grant  us  our  request  hi  the  interests  of 
labor  and  the  nation,  -and  we  will  ever  remain,  as  in 
duty  bound,  the  CHANDLERS  AND  GAS  MEN  OF 
FRANCE.' 

"  What  patriots  !  Almost  as  great  as  the  lobby 
and  Congress  at  Washington  !  " 

"  But  the  old  woollen  mill  burned  hisself  down, 
and  it'll  give  work  to  our  folks  building  the  old 
thing  up,"  interposed  Henry  Farmer. 

a  Yes,"  replied  the  squire,  "if  we  rebuild,  which 
is  somewhat  doubtful.  But  in  that  case  the  laugh 
is  not  all  on  the  labor  side.  For,  look:  it  is  in 
building  houses  that  the  tariff  taxes  pile  themselves 
in  —  they  swarm,  they  inhabit,  they  colonize  ;  they 
climb  from  corner-stone  to  roof-tree  ;  they  dance  on 
the  shingles  ;  they  huddle  under  the  eaves ;  they 
sleep  under  the  rafters;  they  grow  brilliant  in  every 
stretch  of  new  paint ;  they  are  hammered  into  the 
house  with  nails ;  they  are  throned  on  the  iron  posts 
and  brasses ;  they  make  forcible  entry ;  they  take  pos- 
session long  before  labor  does,  and  labor  sleeps 
sweet,  if  at  all,  under  'protection,'  in  a  house 
haunted  by  taxes  and  made  '  a  dear  home'  by  extor- 
tions. In  the  case  of  a  corporation  house,  like  the 
woollen  mill,  the  stockholders  pay  these  taxes,  but 
they  must  and  do  put  them  on  their  goods,  and  the 
consumer  pays  accordingly,  just  as  the  increased 
cost  of  every  tenement  or  hired  house  through  tariff 


OR,  OUR  TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.        103 

taxes  is  paid  as  more  rent  by  the  tenants.  In  the 
ease  of  a  mill,  the  stockholders,  having  had  to  pay 
more  for  their  building,  have  less  capital  out  of 
which  to  pay  their  help  ;  they  must  therefore  econo- 
mize in  wages  all  they  can,  and  thus  the  laborer, 
who  is  both  producer  and  consumer,  loses  at  both 
ends  —  in  what  he  earns  and  in  what  he  spends. 

"This  lumber  tax  is  especially  cruel.  Owing  to 
its  bulk  and  the  remote,  wild  places  where  it  is  pro- 
duced, both  saving  it,  as  by  a  tariff  law  of  Nature, 
from  becoming  very  plenty  in  our  villages  and 
cities,  it  would  be  difficult  to  overstock  our  markets 
by  any  importation.  Besides,  our  lumber  men  are 
swiftly  destroying  our  American  forests,  which  is 
sure  to  become  a  curse  to  our  climate  and  our  agri- 
culture. Yet  our  citizens  who  own  lumber  land  in 
Canada  (and  millions  of  such  acres  are  held  by 
them)  are  forbidden  to  import  their  own  property 
across  an  imaginary  line  without  paying  the  taxes. 
As  things  are,  a  farmer  can  buy  an  agricultural 
machine  of  any  sort  —  made  and  exported  from  the 
United  States  to  Canada  —  cheaper  in  Canada  than 
he  can  in  his  own  home  market,  which  is  another 
way  this  blessed  tariff  has  of  protecting  our  farmers 
from  the  competition  of  Canada  wheat,  by  giving  their 
Canadian  competitors  cheaper  tools  to  work  with. 

"  I  compute  that  any  house  built  in  the  United 
States  costs  its  builder  from  one-third  to  one-fourth 
more  for  the  tariff  taxes.  That  it  costs  very  much 
more,  I  think  is  shown  from  the  fact  that  when  this 


104  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

nation  pitied  its  two  burned  cities  —  Chicago  and 
Eastport  —  it  took  off  the  tariff  taxes  from  their  build- 
ing material,  and  these  cities  were  very  thankful  for 
a  real  load  taken  off.  I  always  understood  that 
everybody  looked  at  the  matter  in  that  way.  But  if 
it  was  a  good  thing  for  those  cities,  why  wouldn't  it 
be  a  good  thing  for  every  mechanic  who  builds  a 
house  for  his  home?  This  is  bad  enough  for  you 
East  here,  who  work  long  to  save  enough  to  build, 
and  who  at  least  are  under  protection  for  your 
manufactured  goods  such  as  this  tariff  makes  it;  but 
it  is  still  worse  for  the  great  farming  population  of 
the  West,  who  cannot  possibly  be  protected  in  any- 
thing they  raise  and  whose  little  houses  and  shanties 
on  the  farms,  where  they  are  trying  to  make  a  living, 
are  made  both  lean  and  expensive  by  tariff  taxes. 

"  I  tell  you  what  it  is,  men  ;  unless  wiser  counsels 
prevail,  somebody  is  going  to  get  badly  hurt.  The 
danger  is  that  when  the  masses  of  American  citizens 
come  to  see  what  hurts  them,  especially  the  Western 
farmers,  they  will  make  short  work  —  I  hope  not 
violent  work  —  with  this  whole  tariff  business.  I 
may  as  well  end  here  to-night,"  Mr.  Freeman  added, 
"unless  somebody  wishes  to  ask  me  a  question." 

"  What's  the  use,  then,  squire,  of  building  up 
that  old  mill  anyhow  ?  "  said  an  old  gray-haired  con- 
servative, with  bushy  side  whiskers,  a  squint  in  his 
left  eye,  and  a  big  quid  of  tobacco  to  his  cheek. 
"  My  father  wove  in  our  old  garret  on  a  hand-loom 
twenty  yards  of  cloth  and  shot  two  dozen  black 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.         105 

ducks  down  the  creek  all  in  one  day.  Them  was 
free  days,  which  a  man  had  to  himself  —  plenty  of 
good  air,  his  babes  below-stairs,  and  his  wife  to  cook 
a  warm  dinner.  But  now  in  these  big  greasy  mills, 
with  nasty  air  and  no  end  of  noise,  men,  and  women 
too,  must  run  to  a  bell  and  snatch  their  grub  at 
twelve  o'clock  like  a  drove  of  cattle,  and  tend  a  big 
machine  with  the  overseer  always  coming  round  to 
find  fault ;  everything  in  a  stew ;  no  liberty,  no 
nothing  but  work.  I  wish  every  weaving  machine 
in  the  land  was  burned  up  as  in  the  old  mill  down 
there.  Machines  are  the  poor  man's  enemy,  I  tell 
you,  squire." 

"  I  am  glad  you  speak  out  in  meeting  that  way, 
Uncle  Joe,"  replied  Mr.  Freeman,  "because  I  know 
you  think  all  that,  and  I  will  try  to  give  your  plain 
question  a  plain  answer.  What  you  say  about  the 
rigid  discipline  and  discomfort  of  a  big  mill  is  very 
often  true.  But  nobody  can  help  it.  These  big 
mills  have  come  because  they  would  and  must. 
They  have  grown  out  of  the  needs  and  nature  of 
human  progress,  just  as  the  telegraph  or  the  rail- 
roads have.  Nobody  could  stop  their  coming  any 
more  than  you  can  stop  anything  else  that  comes, 
that  grows  up,  with  civilization. 

"  The  world  has  grown  to  be  so  big  that  you  can't 
clothe  it  any  longer  by  weaving  on  hand-looms  in  a 
garret.  Those  good  old  times  were  not  so  much 
better,  after  all,  than  ours  (I  think  they  were  much 
worse)  ;  but,  good  or  bad,  they  have  gone,  not  to 


106  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

come  back  any  more  than  flintlock  guns  or  shelling 
corn  with  a  corncob,  will.  And  this  machinery, 
without  which  the  world  that  now  is  could  not  live 
comfortably  a  week,  but  must  go  back  to  barbarism, 
makes  these  big  shops  necessary.  But  what  you  say 
about  machinery,  as  we  Yankees  put  it,  is  '  teetotally ' 
wrong.  You  are  all  out  there,  Uncle  Joe — never 
more  so.  I  know  that  many  of  you  laboring  people 
think  that  machinery  is  an  enemy  and  a  curse  to 
labor  because  one  machine  may  do  ten  men's  work, 
and  so  nine  men  stand  idle.  Why  don't  you  ask 
your  protection  friends  in  Congress  to  kill  all  these 
machines  somehow,  by  taxing  them  a  thousand  per 
cent,  say?  For  if  protection  thinks  it  a  wise  thing 
to  protect  home  labor  against  foreign  labor,  it  is  log- 
ically bound  to  protect  hand  labor  against  machine 
labor,  in  order  to  make  more  labor  for  mechanics. 
Remember  what  I  told  you  about  bad  labor.  In- 
deed, if  labor  is  all  that  is  wanted,  whether  good  or 
bad,  there  are  a  thousand  ways  to  make  it — pass  a  law, 
for  instance,  that  every  carpenter  shall  saw  with  a  dull 
saw,  or,  better  still,  that  every  mechanic  shall  work 
with  his  left  hand,  and  it  will  take  more  men  —  twenty 
to  one  —  to  do  the  same  job  that  took  one.  The  pro- 
tection temper  is  always  shutting  up  and  shutting 
out  something.  When  there  was  fear  that  the 
wheat  of  Portugal  would  come  into  Spain,  a  Spanish 
congressman  gravely  proposed  that  the  Douro  River, 
by  which  it  was  coming,  should  be  closed  to  naviga- 
tion. When  France  took  off  certain  tolls  from  her 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.        107 

canals,  a  clamor  was  raised  to  put  them  on  again  to 
prevent  German  goods  from  enjoying  the  new  cheap- 
ness. What  is  the  use  of  building  railroads  and 
steamships — great  machines  and  free-trade  agencies 
as  they  are  —  tending  to  make  plenty  and  cheap- 
ness, if  it  is  wise  to  hinder  them  from  carrying  out 
or  into  the  country  freights  and  cargoes,  by  a  tariff 
which  tries  to  make  scarcity,  while  the  very  nature 
of  cheap  transportation  is  to  make  plenty  ?  Under 
the  old  protection  laws  of  England  the  Middlesex 
farmers  petitioned  Parliament  against  building  new 
roads  or  repairing  the  old  ones,  since  bad  roads 
would  hinder  farmers  farther  off  from  competing 
with  them  in  the  London  market.  The  farmers 
who  raised  beans  in  a  certain  English  county  also 
petitioned  for  protection  against  the  beans  of  an- 
other county.  When  the  fate  of  England  hung  in 
the  balance  at  the  close  of  the  Corn-Law  struggle,  — 
a  struggle  between  the  English  aristocracy  and  the 
English  people  for  free  bread  and  free  men,  —  when 
there  was  danger  to  the  throne  and  to  the  peace  of 
the  land,  —  the  ribbon-makers  came  to  the  House  of 
Commons,  whining  that  if  their  miserable  ribbons 
were  not  protected  England  would  fall  in  ruins. 
Great  France  will  have  only  French  coal  for  her 
navy  and  French  oats  for  her  army  and  ought  to 
have  only  French  air  for  her  babies,  when  she  has 
any,  by  building  a  wall  high  enough  along  the  Chan- 
nel to  keep  out  English  air.  She  refuses  to  allow 
any  foreign  bids  when  she  erects  an  international 


108  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

exhibition  building  in  Paris,  and  if  she  dared  would, 
DO  doubt,  tax  every  foreigner  living  under  her  laws. 
Is  it  any  wonder,  then,  that  in  carrying  out  such  a 
merciless  war  against  foreign  industries  her  people 
should  follow  logically  her  protection  fallacies,  as 
when  lately  the  Paris  glaziers  asked  the  munici- 
pality of  that  city  to  forbid  any  one  but  themselves 
to  repair  a  window  or  set  a  pane  of  glass ;  or  the 
Paris  carpenters  successfully  petitioned  that  boards 
planed  in  the  suburbs  should  be  taxed  on  entering 
Paris ;  or  that  the  Paris  washerwomen  petitioned 
that  4  the  pauper  labor '  of  their  sisters  up  and  down 
the  Seine  should  be  taxed  on  bringing  into  town 
their  weekly  wash  to  their  customers  ?  Protection, 
built  on  a  basis  of  injustice,  is  forever  developing 
into  absurdities  and  making  war  on  machinery, 
steamships,  railroads,  progress,  civilization,  and  the 
comforts  of  mankind.  It  is  fated  to  be  mean  in 
temper  and  destructive  to  fair  and  friendly  dealing 
between  men  and  between  nations.  It  should  be 
painted  as  a  gigantic  mouth  forever  open  and  for- 
ever devouring  other  people's  goods. 

"  Now  the  hatred  of  some  laboring-men  to  machin- 
ery as  the  enemy  of  labor  reminds  me  of  a  game  of 
cards  I  have  seen  played  on  the  cars  by  a  gang 
of  gamblers  against  the  public.  A  card  is  turned 
up,  and  then  turned  down  again,  arid  now  lies 
on  top.  You  saw  it  to  be,  let  us  say,  the  Ace 
of  Hearts,  and  so  it  is.  You  are  willing  to  bet 
money,  according  to  your  purse,  upon  the  testimony 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          109 

of  your  own  eyes.  If  you  do  you  lose.  Why? 
Because,  unseen  by  you,  the  rogue  who  shuffled  the 
cards  will  now  change  the  card,  and  in  doing  so  has 
changed  the  whole  situation.  The  game  is  only  com- 
pleted and  the  result  of  the  whole  transaction  seen 
when  you  pay  your  bet,  out  of  which  you  are  swin- 
dled. Yet  your  eyes  did  not  deceive  you.  So  with 
your  hostility  to  machinery.  Every  new  labor-saving 
machine  does  displace  laborers,  and  often  throws  them 
into  great  distress.  Their  fellow-laborers  see  it  with 
their  own  eyes,  and  conclude  that  the  machine  is  a 
curse.  But  the  whole  is  not  seen.  Before  the  art 
of  printing,  all  books  and  documents  were  written 
or  transcribed  with  the  pen,  a  trade  which  created  a 
whole  army  of  copyists,  and  the  books  thus  made 
often  cost  a  large  estate.  But  when  Guteriburg,  in 
the  fifteenth  century,  invented  the  printing-press, 
his  invention  destroyed  the  old  trade,  to  the  great 
distress  and  provocation  of  the  craft.  In  fact,  it 
destroyed  a  great  and  lucrative  occupation.  Yet  now 
millions  earn  a  livelihood  from  the  printing,  and  a 
laborer  may  read  in  his  newspaper  (price,  two  cents) 
the  news  of  the  world  at  a  cost  many  times  less  than 
it  would  be  if  copied  in  the  old  method.  Was  the 
printing-press  a  mistake  against  the  laboring-man  ? 
When  those  wonderful  machines  for  spinning  cotton 
and  woollen  yarns,  which  to-day  feed  millions  with 
work,  were  invented,  the  English  laborers  broke  into 
the  shops  and  burned  them  up  in  riots  which  had  to 
be  put  down  by  the  military.  They  saw  only  the 


110  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

temporary  distress,  and  did  not  see  the  permanent 
increase  of  comfort  which  "came  later  on  arid  stayed. 
For  if  anything  in  the  labor  question  is  proved 
beyond  question,  it  is  that  every  labor-saving  ma- 
chine lifts  labor  into  greater  comfort  and  higher 
wages.  Look  over  the  world  to-day,  and  where  you 
find  the  most  machines  you  will  find  the  most  labor 
and  the  highest  wages ;  the  fewest  machines,  the  low- 
est wages.  If  a  man  wants  to  get  rid  of  machinery 
let  him  take  money  in  his  purse  and  go  among 
savages,  where  only  there  is  none.  In  a  week's  time 
he  will  be  ready  to  come  back  where  machinery  and 
civilization  both  are.  Protection,  when  it  avails, 
makes  scarceness,  machinery  makes  plenty,  and  in 
the  long  run  I  am  sure  that  the  machinery  will  win. 
Yes,  and  the  people  who  know  the  most  about  patents 
are  the  very  men  who  tell  us  that  we  are  close  to  the 
invention  of  other  wonderful  labor-saving  machines. 
The  United  States  Labor  Report  for  1886  says,  that 
for  the  past  fifteen  or  twenty  years  the  gain  in  pro- 
duction by  improved  machinery  has  been,  in  agricul- 
tural implements,  from  50  to  70  per  cent;  in  shoes, 
80  per  cent ;  carriages,  65  per  cent ;  in  silk,  50  per 
cent,  and  BO  on.1  In  1776,  Adam  Smith,  in  his 
*  Wealth  of  Nations '  (Vol.  I.,  Chap.  1),  mentions 
it  as  wonderful  that  ten  men  could  make  upwards  of 
48,000  pins  a  day.  In  1888,  our  consul  in  Manches- 
ter reported  home  that  three  men  tending  machines 
could  make  about  7,500,000  pins  a  day.  Spindles, 
that  in  1874  made  4000  revolutions  in  a  minute, 

*  See  note,  p.  243, 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          Ill 

now  make  10,000.  By  late  improvements  in  ma- 
rine engines  in  steamships,  one-half  the  coal  is 
saved,  and  where  the  old  vessels  on  a  long  voyage 
had  to  carry  2200  tons  of  coal,  and  therefore  only 
800  tons  of  freight,  the  new  vessels  with  the  new 
machinery  can  carry  2200  tons  of  freight  and  only 
800  tons  of  coal.  Sir  Lyon  Playfair,  a  scientific 
authority,  says  of  these  improvements  that  ca  small 
cake  of  coal,  which  would  pass  through  a  ring  the 
size  of  a  shilling,  when  burned  in  the  compound 
engine  of  a  modern  steamboat,  would  drive  a  ton  of 
food  and  its  own  proportion  of  the  ship  two  miles  on 
its  way  from  a  foreign  port.'  The  London  Engineer 
magazine  says  that  it  has  been  computed  'that  half 
a  sheet  of  note-paper  will  develop  sufficient  power, 
when  burned  in  connection  with  the  triple-expansion 
engine,  to  carry  a  ton  a  mile  in  an  Atlantic  steamer.' 
"  Now  I  have  given  you  these  instances  in  order 
to  save  you  from  being  misled  by  the  Protectionists 
when  they  tell  you  that  prices  have  gone  down  here 
under  our  tariff,  and  that  protection  did  it.  Since 
1872,  to  the  surprise  of  every  one,  prices  have  gone 
down  in  eveiy  civilized  country,  and  have  gone  down 
to  stay,  while  wages  have  everywhere  gone  up. 
Protection  didn't  do  it,  but  improved  machinery  and 
means  of  transportation  did.  They  make  plenty, 
they  are  free-trade  emissaries  bringing  and  carrying 
comforts  to  men  everywhere  they  are  allowed  to  go. 
Therefore  no  wise  laborer  will  ever  quarrel  with  a 
labor-saving  machine." 


112  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 


CHAPTER   VII. 

WHEN  Mr.  Freeman  met  his  men  the  next  even- 
ing, he  said,  "  I  am  going  now  to  discuss  the  ques- 
tion of  the  effect  of  the  American  tariff  on  the 
American  laborer.  A  tariff  like  ours,  regulating 
how  the  nation  shall  buy  and  sell  with  the  rest  of 
the  world,  must  either  help  or  harm.  Now  I  expect 
you  will  attend  carefully.  For  this  is  your  matter, 
it  comes  home  and  sticks  to  you,  and  you  are  less 
than  men  if  you  do  not  study  the  question  down  to 
its  roots.  Does  this  tariff  help  labor  ?  If  it  does  it 
should  stand.  If  it  hurts  it  should  fall  for  the  sake 
of  every  one,  since,  if  the  condition  of  labor  be  bad, 
business  cannot  be  good.  For  labor  and  business 
are  as  intimately  connected  as  eggs  are  with  an 
omelet.  Or  you  may  turn  this  statement  the  other 
end  foremost  and  say  that  if  business  be  bad  the 
condition  of  labor  cannot  be  good.  The  two  stand 
or  fall  together. 

"Now  I  have  already  argued,  so  far,  that  this  tar- 
iff has  not  only  not  protected  our  home  or  our  for- 
eign market,  our  business,  in  short,  but  injured  both 
greatly.  Exactly  so  far  as  you  admit  that  I  have 
proved  my  point,  you  must  also  admit  and  assert 
that  this  tariff  is  an  injury  to  labor.  But  without 
asking  your  assent  just  here  to  anything  already  said, 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.        113 

I  will  now  examine  this  tariff  from  the  laboring- 
man's  standpoint.  He  always  wants  all  the  wages 
he  can  honestly  get.  Does  the  tariff  raise  his  wages  ?* 
Let  me  go  one  step  at  a  time.  Are  the  laboring 
classes  satisfied  with  the  present  condition  of  the 
labor  market  under  this  present  tariff  ?  If  they  are, 
why  do  they  have  all  sorts  of  labor  unions  and  go 
out  so  often  on  strikes  ?  Henry  George  has  said 
lately,  '  The  working-men  of  this  country  have  pre- 
cipitated more  than  three  thousand  strikes  during 
the  past  year  to  better  their  condition,  involving  the 
loss  of  more  than  $350,000,000.'  I  have  no  reason 
to  think  that  he  overstates  the  matter.2  I  am  aware 
that  working-men  are  not  always  right,  nor  their 
employers  always  wrong ;  but  I  am  sure  that,  mak- 
ing all  allowance  for  their  mistakes,  the  laboring 
classes  have  just  cause  to  be  deeply  dissatisfied  with 
their  condition.  They  are  hurt,  they  feel  it,  and 
they  don't  know  exactly  what  hurts  them.  And  all 
this  under  our  so-called  protective  system. 

"Richard  Cobden,  the  great  Corn-Law  reformer, 
once  said  that  'when  two  masters  run  after  one  man, 
wages  are  high.  When  two  men  run  after  one 
master,  wages  are  low.'  That  is  a  very  bright 
statement  of  the  law  of  supply  and  demand,  which 
lies  at  the  root  of  all  business,  and  is  almost  as 
unchangeable  as  the  law  of  gravitation.  But  the 
questions  for  us  which  lie  behind  Cobden's  state- 
ment are  these :  When  and  why  do  two  masters  run 
after  one  man  ?  and  when  and  why  do  two  men  run 

1  See  note,  p.  246.          a  See  note,  p.  247. 


114  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

after  one  master?  The  answer  in  the  rough  to  both 
questions  is:  When  and  because  business  is  good; 
and  when  and  because  business  is  bad.  So  this 
law  of  supply  and  demand  must  have  something  to 
do  with  your  wages,  let  alone  the  tariff.  That  is 
perhaps  the  chief  reason  why  wages  in  the  same 
trade  often  differ  so  much  in  different  parts  of  this 
country.  The  United  States  Census  Report  for 
1880,  for  instance,  showed  in  the  different  iron  in- 
dustries of  the  country  the  following  yearly  average 
wages :  in  the  Eastern  States,  $417  ;  Western,  $396 ; 
Pacific,  $354 ;  Southern,  $304 ;  the  extreme  difference 
between  sections  being,  as  you  can  see,  $113  in  the 
wages  of  a  single  workman,  —  quite  as  much  as  the 
average  difference  between  English  and  American 
wages.  It  is  also  not  a  little  singular,  if  the  protec- 
tion doctrine  be  true,  that  the  wages  of  laborers,  like 
carpenters,  masons,  and  men  who  build  or  dig,  or  work 
on  railroads  or  on  telegraph  lines,  who,  from  the  na- 
ture of  their  work,  cannot  be  directly  protected  by  the 
tariff,  are  often  very  much  higher  than  in  the  so-called 
protected  industries ;  and  that  too  with  labor  perfectly 
free  to  come  in  upon  our  people  from  all  the  world." 

"  But  ain't  our  work-people  better  paid  here  than 
anywhere  else  ?  "  asked  Uncle  Joe. 

"  In  general,  so  far  as  the  mere  wages  go,  they 
are.  The  highest  rates  of  wages  in  the  world  are  in 
Australia,  a  British  and  a  free-trade  country.  The 
next  highest  wages  to  our  own  are  paid  in  England, 
also  a  free-trade  country.  And  if  you  are  about 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          115 

to  tell  me,  Uncle  Joe,  that  our  wages  are  high 
because  of  our  tariff  I  will  give  you  this  nut  to  crack, 
namely,  why  it  is  that  wages  are  much  higher  in  free- 
trade  England  than  in  any  protected  country  in 
Europe.1  Indeed,  from  1872  to  1875,  wages  in  many 
trades  were  higher  in  England  than  here.  In  gen- 
eral, so  far  as  I  can  make  out  from  the  statistics,  and 
brushing  away  the  swarm  of  misrepresentation 
which  envelops  this  question,  I  should  say,  as  a  fair 
estimate,  that  English  wages  are  generally  from  one- 
fourth  to  one-third  less  than  ours.  But  all  living 
expenses  (especially  house-rents),  except  provisions 
(meats,  vegetables,  etc.),  are  very  much  less  there 
than  here."  2 

"  Why,  then,  squire,"  interrupted  Uncle  Joe,  "  are 
they  always  coming  out  here  to  take  our  work  if 
they  are  well  enough  off  at  home  and  America  isn't 
a  better  place  for  the  working-people  ?" 

"  America  is  a  better  place,  the  best  place  in  the 
World  for  any  honest  workman  who  will  work  as  the 
American  mechanics  do.  But  God  and  the  Ameri- 
can people  made  it  so,  not  the  tariff.  The  English, 
German,  or  French  mechanic  comes  here  to  better 
his  condition,  and  he  will  certainly  do  so  if  he  will 
work  as  American  mechanics  do,  although  in  the 
hard  times  that  followed  1873  a  great  many  went 
back  home  as  the  better  place  for  them.  No  Euro- 
pean mechanic  can  come  here  and  thrive  unless  he 
can  take  up  our  American  ways  of  work.  A  manu- 
facturer in  Pawtucket  told  me  that  after  the  war  his 

1  United  States  Consular  Labor  Report,  vol.  i.  p.  178. 

2  See  note;  p.  248. 


116  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

firm  imported  English  workmen  in  their  calico-print- 
ing establishment.  He  said  that  generally  the 
younger  men  took  to  our  mechanical  ways,  got  on, 
and  stayed.  The  elders  could  not  and  mostly  went 
back.  Go  and  see  how  an  Englishman  calks  a  vessel, 
and  then  see  how  an  American  mechanic  does  the 
same  job,  and  you  will  find  the  difference  to  be  greatly 
in  the  American's  favor.  I  know  the  solid,  steady 
work-power  of  an  English  mechanic  ;  but  I  know 
that  the  American  mechanic  has,  in  general,  more 
snap,  push,  sleight-of-hand,  than  his  English  brother, 
and  works  more  hours.  Besides,  he  has  more  to 
work  for,  more  ambition  to  get  on  and  up.  When 
they  let  out  the  McKay  sewing-machine  (an  Ameri- 
can invention)  to  the  English  manufacturers  of 
boots  and  shoes,  it  was  found,  after  due  trial  and 
investigation,  that  on  these  machines  the  English 
mechanic  could  turn  off  not  more  than  forty-five 
per  cent  of  what  a  Yankee  could.1  What  is  true  of 
the  McKay  sewing-machine  is  true  of  any  other,  and 
what  I  have  said  of  the  McKay  machine  can  be 
proved  any  day  by  evidence  satisfactory  to  a  court 
of  law.  I  said  just  now  that  American  wages  are 
somewhat  higher  than  European  wages,  and  I  stand 
to  it.  Does  the  tariff  make  them  higher?  Does  the 
tariff  create  the  push,  dash,  brain,  courage,  ambition 
of  an  American  mechanic,  which  makes  him  the 
ablest  and  therefore  the  cheapest  of  all  mechanics  in 
the  world,  or  has  he  done  this  for  himself? 

"Let  me  tell  you  another  fact  which  the  protec- 

1  See  note,  p.  248. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          117 

tionist  seldom  speaks  of.  Considering  the  return,  the 
value  in  work  which  the  American  mechanic  gives 
back  for  his  wages  to  his  employer,  —  the  American 
is  worse  paid  than  almost  any  other  mechanic  in 
the  civilized  world,  — he  is  the  cheapest  workman  of 
them  all.  For  low  wages  are  not  necessarily  cheap 
wages  to  the  man  who  hires;  they  may  be  very 
dear  wages.1  As  a  rule,  a  low-priced  laborer  is  an  ex- 
pensive laborer.  When  Mr.  Brassey,  the  great  rail- 
road contractor,  was  building  roads  in  India  he 
began  by  hiring  Indian  sepoys  at  about  twelve  cents 
a  day.  He  found  this  low  price  too  dear,  and  saved 
money  by  importing  British  railroad-builders  at 
$1.25  per  day,  whom  he  found  cheaper  to  hire.  The 
man  who  is  paid  $5  a  day  and  earns  his  employer 
$10  is  a  much  cheaper  man  than  he  who,  paid  $1  a 
day,  earns  only  the  dollar.  Indeed  such  men  as  the 
last,  hired  long  enough,  would  break  down  any  busi- 
ness. 6 Pauper  labor'  is  not  merely  poorly  paid, 
it  is  labor  that  poorly  produces  —  its  results  are 
thin  and  mean.  Let  me  give  another  fact  in  proof. 
In  1887,  in  our  Northwest,  with  wages  at  $25  a 
month  with  board,  wheat  could  be  produced  at  a  cost 
of  40  cents  a  bushel,  while  in  Rhenish  Prussia,  in  the 
same  year,  with  wages  about  $6  a  month,  the  cost 
was  80  cents  a  bushel.  What  did  that  ?  The  tariff? 
No ;  the  pluck  of  that  most  resolute  of  human  creat- 
ures in  getting  on  —  an  American  citizen  working  on 

1  "  The  inequalities  in  the  wages  of  England  and  America  are  more 
than  equalled  by  the  greater  efficiency  of  the  latter  and  their  longer 
hours  of  labor,"  (J.  Gr.  Blame's  Report  as  Secretary  of  State,  1881.) 


118  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

a  fat  prairie  with  the  best  machines  —  did  it,  and  did 
it  in  spite  of  all  the  tariff  taxes  on  his  back ! 

"  Take  a  few  other  figures  to  show  the  same  fact. 
Mechanics  employed  in  the  United  States,  5,000,000 
plus.  Mechanics  employed  in  England,  5,000,000 
plus.  Our  men  produced  18,000,000,000;  the  Eng- 
lish mechanics,  $4,000,000,000.  These  figures  are 
from  the  report  of  the  Tariff  Commission  of  the 
47th  Congress.  In  1879,  Mr.  Thornley,  an  expert  in 
cotton  manufacture  from  Manchester,  England,  came 
over  to  study  our  cotton-mills.  He  reported  home 
that  the  cost  of  labor  here  per  yard  of  cotton  cloth 
was  less  than  in  Manchester.1 

"It  is  not  what  a  manufacturer  pays  his  help,  but 
what  his  help  give  him  back  in  work,  that  deter- 
mines his  profit,  and  so  his  ability  to  keep  on.  A 
man  who  starts  out  with  cheap  machinery  and  cheap 
labor  must  go  at  last  into  bankruptcy.  Business  to 
be  successful  must  use  the  best  tool  and  the  best 
man.  The  American  mechanic  does  double  work  as 
compared  with  the  English  standard,  and  from  two 
to  three  times  the  work  done  on  the  continent  of 
Europe,,  by  a  Frenchman,  a  Spaniard,  a  German,  or 
a  Russian.  The  American  mechanic  earns  better 
wages  simply  because  he  does  better,  that  is,  more 
work.  The  tariff  has  nothing  to  do  with  that,  and 
could. not  help  him  to  these  wages  unless  he  earned 
them.  It  is  not  the  tariff  which  has  carried  our 
manufacturers  through  our  commercial  crises  and 
distresses,  burdened  as  they  are  with  taxes,  but  the 

i  See  note,  p.  249. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         119 

strong  right  hand  and  arm  of  the  American  work- 
man, who  has  carried  both  man  and  master ;  and  if 
that  hand  and  arm  are  ever  free  from  the  tariff 
chains,  he  will  become  master  of  the  industrial 
world. 

"  Let  me  show  in  another  way  that  his  own  labor 
and  riot  the  tariff  gives  the  American  mechanic  his 
high  wages,  which  are  yet  so  cheap  to  his  employer. 
Leaving  our  agricultural  products  out  of  the  ques- 
tion, and  the  only  goods  that  can  crawl  out  of  this 
country  under  the  tariff  load  are  (1)  either  goods 
made  from  free  raw  material,  like  cotton  goods  or 
leather;  or  (2)  goods  whose  value  consists  chiefly, 
not  in  the  material,  but  in  the  cheap  work  of  the 
well-paid  American  mechanic  which  has  gone  into 
them.  (1)  As  to  raw  materials:  if  goods  made 
from  some  free  raw  materials  can  be  sold  abroad  at  a 
profit,  why  could  not  goods  made  from  any  raw 
material,  wool  or  iron,  for  instance,  be  sold  also? 
I  am  told  that  our  drummers,  sent  down  by  our  New- 
York  merchants  to  sell  goods  in  Mexico,  are  taking 
orders  for  American  cottons  and  English  woollens. 
Why  not  American  woollens?  Fifty  per  cent  tariff 
taxes  on  wool  is  the  reason.1  Now  I  repeat,  if  you 
shut  out  the  world,  the  world  will  try  to  shut  out 
you.  We  have  tried  this  business  quarrel  with  the 
world,  and  by  consequence  our  goods  cannot  get 
out.  Taxes  therefore  kill  the  market  for  what  our 
American  mechanics  create  at  a  low  price.  There- 
fore they  paralyze  business,  on  which  wages  depend. 

i  See  note,  p.  250. 


120  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

Therefore  the  tendency,  so  far  as  this  tariff  goes,  is 
to  lower  wages  and  more  frequent  shutdowns  in 
the  factories.  Let  me  re-inforce  this  position  by 
the  mention  of  a  very  significant  fact.  A  well- 
known  American  manufacturer,  Mr.  Sargent  of  New 
Haven,  has  lately  been  round  the  world.  'Every- 
where I  went,'  he  says,  4I  met  American  cotton 
goods.  I  even  saw  these  goods  going  in  through 
the  gates  of  Pekin,  with  the  American  merchant's 
name  on  the  bales.  I  nowhere  saw  a  yard  of  Ameri- 
can woollen  goods.'  What's  the  matter?  This 
tariff  which  makes  labor  lean  at  home  and  exports 
abroad  only  the  ghost  of  what  we  might. 

"  (2)  As  to  goods  in  the  cost  of  which  labor  is  a 
large  element :  if,  wherever  the  value  of  our  goods 
consists  chiefly  in  the  labor  our  mechanics  put  into 
them,  and  not  in  the  value  of  the  material  composing 
them,  these  goods  can  be  sold  in  the  foreign  markets 
in  competition  with  .foreign  labor,  does  it  not  prove 
that  we  fail  to  sell,  as  masters  of  the  trade  of  the 
world,  simply  because  the  raw  material  is  taxed  ;  and 
that  our  mechanics,  if  they  had  a  fair  show,  have 
nothing  to  fear  from  foreign  pauper  labor  or  any 
other  kind  of  labor  except  the  labor  of  the  protec- 
tionist trying  to  cast  burdens  on  other  men's  shoul- 
ders that  he  may  put  money  in  his  own  purse.  Let 
me  state  one  case,  like  ten  thousand  others,  which 
occur  in  our  business  every  year.  A  certain  firm  of 
manufacturers  in  New  England  needed  some  $30,000 
worth  of  machinery  to  go  into  a  new  mill,  and  ad- 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         121 

vertised  accordingly.  Several  American  firms  com- 
peted, but  the  contract  was  finally  given  to  an 
English  firm  through  their  agent  in  New  York,  who 
were  able  to  underbid  the  others,  bring  their  machin- 
ery three  thousand  miles  across  the  Atlantic  Ocean, 
pay  the  Custom  House  dues,  and  yet  sell  at  a  profit, 
because  England  has  free  coal  and  free  iron.  In 
this  way  they  tell  you  they  'protect'  American 
labor.  American  labor  can  protect  itself  whenever 
this  tariff  is  forced  to  let  it  alone. 

"  The  following  facts  about  American  labor  seem 
to  be  now  established  beyond  any  honest  question  :  — 

"1.  The  American  farmer  pays  the  highest  farm 
wages  and  yet  is  able  to  compete  with  the  poorest 
paid  help  in  the  world.  2.  The  natives  of  India 
engaged  in  making  'gunny'  cloth,  the  lowest-paid 
of  any  engaged  in  manufactures  (12  cents  a  day), 
have  been  driven  out  of  their  own  market  by  the 
American  manufacturer,  who  pays  from  seven  to  ten 
times  as  much  to  his  women  operatives.  3.  In  the 
Bessemer  steel  business  our  output  per  man  is  more 
than  50  per  cent  greater  than  in  England.  4.  The 
cost  in  wages  of  weaving  100  yards  of  print  cloth  in 
the  United  States  is  40  cents,  against  55  cents  in 
England  and  60  cents  in  Switzerland,  though  we 
pay  the  highest  wages — from  80  cents  to  $1.12^  as 
against  65  cents  in  England,  and  from  44  to  49  cents 
in  Switzerland. 

"  5.  In  the  calico-printing  business  the  printers 
often  get  $4.50  a  day,  and  can  turn  out,  with  a 


122  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

helper,  from  12,500  to  20,000  yards  a  day.  Ger- 
many, paying  one-third  the  wages,  cannot  compete 
with  us  in  print  cloth. 

"  6.  The  American  clock  and  watch  makers,  pay- 
ing four  times  as  high  wages  as  are  paid  abroad,  can 
undersell  their  European  competitors,  and  exported, 
in  1887,  more  than  double  in  value  what  our  exports 
of  wool  and  woollens  came  to. 

"  7.  In  Lynn  a  pair  of  lady's  gaiters  can  be  made 
for  35  cents,  cost  of  labor;  while  in  Erfurt,  Germany, 
where  wages  are  one-half  lower  than  with  us,  the 
same  kind  of  gaiters  cost  nearly  70  cents. 

"  8.  Nowhere  in  the  world  has  it  happened  that 
wages  have  gone  down  when  raw  material  has  been 
free.  Always  wages  have  gone  up. 

"  9.  In  spite  of  our  immense  resources  as  a  nation, 
and  because  machinery  is  multiplying  every  year 
and  consequently  our  production,  it  is  as  certain  as 
anything  in  the  future  can  be,  that,  owing  to  a  con- 
sequent tendency  to  a  glut  in  our  home  market  and 
our  inability  to  contend  successfully  in  foreign  mar- 
kets, our  so-called  protective  system  will  at  no  dis- 
tant date  drive  down  wages  and  keep  them  low."  l 

"But  last  'lection,  squire,  they  told  us  to  vote 
Republican  and  tariff  to  keep  up  wages,  for  the 
laboring-man,  they  said,"  interrupted  Uncle  Joe. 

"I  know  very  well  they  did  —  a  trick  of  theirs. 
The  laboring-man  has  a  vote,  in  fact  he  decides  who 
shall  be  president,  and  those  gentlemen ^of  the  Pro- 

1  See  "  Relation  of  Tariff  to  Wages."    David  A.  Wells. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         123 

tection  stripe  dearly  love  a  laboring-man  —  election 
times.  '  Whom  the  Lord  loveth  He  chasteneth,'  but 
whom  the  protectionist  loveth  he  robbeth,  loving 
himself  least  that  he  may  rob  the  other  fellow  most. 
When  the  man  'who  went  down  from  Jerusalem 
to  Jericho '  fell  among  thieves,  they  stripped  and 
wounded  him,  but  then  they  left  him  alone  with  his 
wounds,  to  lie  still  or  get  up  as  he  would  or  could. 
But  when  protection  strips  a  man  of  his  due  wages 
or  use  of  his  wages  in  buying  him  comfort  where 
he  can  buy  cheapest,  then  it  comes  round  election 
times,  and  slobbers,  in  the  anaconda  fashion,  the 
laboring-man  all  over  with  its  sick  sympathy,  which 
conceals  a  purpose  to  get  some  more  goods  out  of 
him  on  false  pretences.  No,  men,  don't  believe  me 
or  any  man  who  talks  that  way  to  you.  Put  wolves, 
if  you  like,  to  shepherd  the  sheep ;  dogs  to  tend  cats; 
hawks  to  brood  over  chickens  ;  but  never  trust  a 
dyed-in-the-wool  protectionist  to  raise  a  man's  wages 
or  to  overlook  a  laborer's  comforts." 

"Hard  again,  squire,  on  our  feller-citizens;  darn- 
ation  tough,  that  is,"  Uncle  Joe  broke  in  again. 

"  Well,"  retorted  Mr.  Freeman,  "  I  mean  to  be. 
If  they  are  not  ashamed  of  the  thing  —  I  mean  their 
sickening,  slimy  sympathy  for  the  laboring  classes, 
in  an  election  struggle  —  I  am  not  ashamed  to  speak 
the  name  which  describes  that  thing.  Look  at  their 
'record;  some  of  them,  I  mean,  not  all.  They  tell 
you  they  want  a  high  tariff  to  protect  the  wages  of 
the  American  workmen,  and  then  they  bring  over 


124  WHAT'S   THE   MATTER? 

here  poor,  ignorant  men  from  all  over  this  world, 
and  from  the  other  world,  too,  if  an  emigrant  ship 
conld  get  there,  to  break  down  their  wages.  Look 
at  the  Pennsylvania  coal  mines  and  the  Hocking 
Valley  horrors  ;  with  men  working  for  sixty  cents  a 
day,  two  days  a  week;  and  Hungarian  women  tend- 
ing coke  fires,  with  insufficient  clothing,  until  the 
legislature  had  the  decency  to  forbid  the  women  by 
statute.  Congress,  even,  has  been  forced  to  forbid 
contract  labor  ;  that  is,  the  hiring  of  men  abroad, 
paying  their  passage  money  here,  and  then  using 
them  under  a  written  contract  in  the  mines  until  the 
passage  money  is  repaid,  as  well  as  their  score  at  the 
agent's  store,  where  prices  are  from  100  to  200  per 
cent  higher  than  elsewhere  ;  all  to  protect  the  dignity 
and  comfort  of  American  labor.  They  have  even 
tried  a  new  dodge  lately.  When  the  operatives  in  a 
New  Jersey  woollen-mill  struck  and  went  out  for 
higher  wages,  as  they  had  a  right,  and  sometimes,  as 
in  this  case,  ought,  the  mill-owners  sent  to  the  Penn- 
sylvania mines  and  brought  from  there  a  gang  of  poor 
Hungarians  to  take  the  strikers'  places  at  wages 
which  were  a  decided  advance  over  the  pittance  they 
had  been  formerly  receiving.  Now  a  great  clanger 
shows  itself  in  that  transaction.  You  have  only  to 
break  down  gradually  any  large  class  of  laborers  into 
abject  poverty ;  then  pit  them  against  another  class 
of  laborers  a  trifle  better  off,  as  these  Newark 
strikers  were,  —  break  them  down,  too,  until  the 
laborers  of  the  United  States  are  under  the  heel  of 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         125 

the  men  who  hire,  having  assisted  to  destroy  each 
other  by  a  pauperism  gradually  but  systematically 
forced  upon  them.  What  is  the  defence  of  labor 
against  all  this  threatened  misery  ?  A  wise,  stern 
vote  from  labor  at  every  ballot-box  —  not  for  '  Pro- " 
tection.' 

"Now  I  will  show  you  another  wTay  in  which 
tariff  protection  deals  with  labor.  When  a  man 
comes  into  my  office,  asking  for  work  in  my  mill, 
he  simply  is  trying  to  sell  me  his  labor,  —  the  only 
goods,  perhaps,  he  has  to  sell,  —  certainly  his  own. 
When  he  stands  there,  all  the  labor  in  the  world  is 
free  to  compete  with  him  for  my  wages.  Protection 
always  favors  free  trade  in  labor,  for  that  it  must  buy. 
But  when  I  have  hired  the  man  and  paid  him  wages, 
he  also  wants  to  buy  something  where  he  can  buy 
it  cheapest.  But  now  the  laugh  comes  in  against 
him,  for  he  is  not  allowed  by  the  tariff  to  buy, 
except  at  protection,  that  is,  inflated  prices,  where 
and  as  the  tariff  says,  as  any  other  slave.  Explain 
it  how  you  like,  the  plain  fact  is  that  the  American 
laborer  sells  his  labor  in  a  free-trade  market  and 
buys  his  comforts  in  a  protection  market.  Now 
I  ask,  if  it  is  right  to  '  protect '  the  employer  against 
competition,  how  can  it  be  wrong  to  protect  his  work- 
men also?  Here,  I  fancy,  is  the  main  reason  of  the 
unrest  and  dissatisfaction  among  our  workmen. 
Wages  are  often  high  enough,  if  the  tariff  taxes 
were  not  higher  still  ;  but  wages  lose  their  purchas- 
ing power,  —  or,  in  other  words,  prices  are  raised 


126  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

unnaturally,  often  one-third,  or  even  more.  Under 
free  trade  the  same  wages  would  buy  one-third  more 
comfort  —  that  is  to  say,  a  workman's  wages  are 
taxed  away  at  least  one-third.  The  working-man 
feels  a  loss  but  cannot  tell  exactly  what  the  matter 
is.  I  say  this  in  order  that  you  may  see  that  if  in 
England  wages  are  less,  prices  are  also  less,  and  the 
difference  in  the  workman's  comfort  there  and  here 
is  less  than  is  generally  supposed.  Free  trade,  there- 
fore, while  it  would  not  diminish  wages,  would  give 
the  working-man  at  least  a  third  more  for  every  dollar 
he  earned.  To-morrow  night  I  will  show  you  what 
free  trade  is." 

As  Mr.  Freeman  went  out,  he  said  to  Uncle  Joe 
by  his  side,  "  I  don't  see  Farmer  round  to-night. 
He  generally  has  something  to  say  among  the  men, 
and  I  like  to  have  him." 

"No,  squire.  Farmer's  in  a  peck  o'  trouble.  Bank 
wants  his  mortgage,  and  he  hain't  got  no  money  to 
lift  it,  and  out  of  work,  you  see." 

"Hum!  mortgage  on  his  new  house.  There's  too 
many  of  those  things  round  almost  everywhere  — 
thick  as  fleas  out  West,  I  hear,  among  the  farmers ; 
too  many  for  anybody's  comfort.  Well,  a  debt  must 
be  paid,  if  it  takes  a  house  or  a  leg.  That's  busi- 
ness. Good-night." 

Yet  it  was  not  business,  but  something  else  —  the 
man  in  him,  perhaps  —  which  led  Mr.  Freeman,  after 
he  had  left  Uncle  Joe,  to  turn  sharp  away  from  home 
down  the  lane  to  Farmer's  house,  which  stood  a 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         127 

little  out  of  the  village,  with  a  grove  of  pine-trees 
behind  it. 

It  was  a  rather  new  and  comfortable  house,  reach- 
ing from  the  lane  back  to  a  small  barn,  with  pens 
for  pigs  and  hens;  and  all  had  a  tidy  look,  as  though 
well  kept.  There  was  a  light  in  the  ell  part,  so  Mr. 
Freeman  knocked  there. 

"Come  in,"  said  the  gruff  voice  of  Henry  Farmer 
inside,  so  he  went  in.  Farmer  was  seated  almost 
over  the  kitchen  stove,  alone,  with  his  hat  on,  and 
when  the  other  man  came  in  he  neither  got  up  nor 
reached  out  his  hand  nor  smiled,  but  merely  said, 
"  Evening,  squire." 

The  squire  helped  himself  to  another  chair  by  the 
stove.  Then  he  went  to  work. 

"  I  hear  your  mortgage  on  this  house  is  called  in." 

"Yes."  " 

"How  much  is  it?" 

"Five  hundred  dollars." 

"  Have  you  the  money  to  take  it  up  ?  " 

"No."  " 

"  What  are  you  going  to  do  ?  " 

"Don't  know  —  don't  care  very  much  anyhow," 
and  he  sat  looking  down  at  the  stove.  Here  was 
labor  at  bay,  and  grim,  as  a  strong  man  in  danger 
usually  is. 

"I'll  take  up  that  mortgage  for  you,  Farmer,  three 
years  arid  six  per  cent ;  and,  if  you're  late,  then  we'll 
try  again." 

"You,   squire!    why,   you're   a    Democrat   and  I 


128  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

gin  you  'siderable  sass  at  the  foundry  the  other 
night.'* 

"  Never  mind  what  I  am.  I'll  do  as  I  say ;  and  as 
for  your  'sass,'  you're  all  wrong  on  the  tariff  ques- 
tion, but  I  don't  mind  your 'sass.'  You  wouldn't 
rob  a  hen-roost,  to  say  nothing  of  a  big  country  like 
ours.  You're  a  hard-working,  honest  fellow,  as  I 
know,  since  we  boys  went  to  school  together,  and 
both  of  us  got  flogged  twice  the  same  day  by  that 
fraud  of  a  red-haired  schoolmaster.  I've  got  the 
money  and  you've  got  the  house,  and  it  will  go  hard 
if  we  two  can't  hold  on  to  one  house  between  us. 
Where's  the  mortgage  ?  " 

"  Bank's  got  it." 

"  Well,  come  round  to  the  office  to-morrow  morn- 
ing, and  I'll  draw  the  papers  to  save  you  expense, 
and  wre'll  4  try,  try  again,'  as  the  song  is." 

Farmer  said  nothing  to  this,  but  sat  staring  at  the 
squire  as  if  in  a  daze.  The  latter  waited  while 
Farmer  seemed  to  be  thawing  out  as  though  he  had 
been  frozen  up  by  some  blast  that  had  gone  to  his 
very  marrow.  At  last,  when,  in  this  process,  he 
came,  as  it  were,  to  himself,  he  slowly  stood  up  and 
reached  an  open  hand  across  the  stove  to  the  squire. 
"  I  never  thought  this  of  you,  squire." 

"  No,  I  know  you  didn't.  But  here  I  am  all  the 
same." 

So  the  two  men  shook  hands.  It  would  not  be 
safe  to  say  that  there  was  no  moisture  in  two  pairs 
of  eyes  just  then. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         129 

"What  are  you  going  to  do,  Farmer,  now  the 
foundry's  shut  down  ?" 

"Don't  know,  squire.  Go  peddling  essences  or 
paper  round  the  country,  p'raps,  suthin*  to  keep  the 
wife  and  little  ones  from  begging." 

"  Oh,  nonsense,  Farmer.  A  good  mechanic  like 
you,  in  health,  need  never  lack  work  long  at  a  time. 
I  need  a  man  at  the  house  and  to  look  after  the 
horses.  You're  my  man.  I  can  depend  on  you,  and 
we'll  fix  it  after  the  mortgage  is  taken  care  of."  So 
Mr.  Freeman  rose  to  go.  "  Comfortable  house  this 
of  yours,  Farmer." 

"Yes,  I've  tried  to  fix  her  up  a  little,  odd 
hours;  but  she  takes  a  deal  of  trouble."  (When 
a  laboring-man  or  sailor  takes  heartily  to  his  house 
or  ship,  he  shows  his  affection  by  speaking  of 
it  as  a  woman.)  "  P'raps  you'd  like  to  look 
round." 

So  Farmer,  with  a  kerosene  lamp  in  his  hand,  led 
the  way  round  the  house.  It  was  a  workman's 
home,  with  a  workman's  wife  to  keep  it  clean,  well 
painted,  stoves  polished,  a  sprinkling  of  high-colored 
chromos  on  the  walls,  describing  improbable  babies 
and  impossible  landscapes,  some  easy-chairs  with 
knit  tidies  over  their  back,  lace  curtains  in  the  best 
room,  and  some  old-fashioned  hair  lounges,  with 
family  portraits  on  the  centre  table,  the  neatest  of 
white  bed-spreads  in  the  sleeping-rooms,  and  a  sink 
with  its  fat  pump,  where  the  housewife  washes 
dishes,  which  would  long  ago  have  been  scoured  into 


130  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER  f 

holes  like  a  sieve,  unless  the  material  of  it  had  been 
of  iron. 

"  Come  see  this  little  feller  here  in  the  cradle," 
and  Farmer's  big  red  hand  reached  out  to  lift,  ten- 
derly as  a  woman  might,  the  cradle  blanket  under 
which,  with  hand  under  chin,  a  chubby,  rosy  little 
boy  was  sleeping  the  sweet,  sound  sleep  of  childhood, 
untroubled  by  mortgages  or  taxes.  Mr.  Freeman 
was  a  bachelor,  but  he  liked  children,  and  now  bent 
down  over  the  babe  and  for  some  time  seemed  to  be 
watching  the  blankets  rise  and  fall  as  the  babe  went 
on  breathing  and  sleeping.  Then  he  went  back  to 
the  kitchen  softly  on  tiptoe,  Farmer  following,  lamp 
in  hand,  and  at  last  said,  "  Do  you  think  now  I 
would  knowingly  go  back  on  the  babies  like  yours 
in  that  cradle,  by  advising  their  fathers  to  a 
course  of  action,  like  smashing  this  tariff,  for  in- 
stance, which  would  harm  them  —  less  bread,  thinner 
blankets,  and  a  tenement-house  for  home  ?  " 

"S'pose  you  wouldn't,  squire." 

"  No,  nor  any  other  man  with  a  soul  in  him.  Be- 
lieve me,  there  is  a  cruelty  sharper  than  steel  can 
make  it ;  the  cruelty  of  those  who,  in  any  land,  make 
the  workman's  lot  harder,  and  his  babes  leaner,  by 
taking  from  him,  under  the  disguise  of  law,  his 
due  wages  and  his  comforts.  Good-night." 

So  Mr.  Freeman  went  out  into  the  sharp,  frosty 
night,  homeward.  The  stars  were  overhead,  num- 
berless as  ever,  and  one  star  just  above  the  eastern 
horizon  was  breaking  into  a  corona  of  green  and 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         131 

crimson  flames,  like  some  magnificent  diamond  on  a 
queen's  brow.  He  looked  round  at  it  all  as  he 
walked  on.  This  was  what  he  thought,  "  What  a 
splendid  world  this  is..  What  a  magnificent  creature 
is  the  human  race.  And  yet  how  little  and  mean 
some  men  show  themselves  to  be  ! " 


132  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

"  I  SHALL  try  to  show  you  to-night,"  Mr.  Freeman 
said,  the  next  time  he  met  the  men  at  the  foundry, 
"  how  free  trade  would  be  a  blessing  to  both  manu- 
facturer and  mechanic ;  professional  men,  railroad 
men,  farmers,  working-women — indeed  to  all  classes 
in  this  country,  except  the  monopolists.  By  monop- 
olists I  mean  those  men  who  have  an  unfair  advan- 
tage in  money-making  over  other  people,  under  our 
present  tariff,  and  whose  business  is  unjustly  fat- 
tened at  other  people's  expense  by  tariff  taxes., 
I  very  early  in  these  talks  explained  to  you  that  the 
free  trade  which  men  like  me  advocate  does  not 
abolish  custom-houses  or  tariffs,  but  only  changes 
the  laws  under  which  the  custom-houses  collect  a 
revenue  to  pay  the  expenses  of  the  national  govern- 
ment, which  all  men  agree  must  and  ought  to  be 
paid,  and  arranges  a  tariff  not  to  put  money  taken 
from  one  man's  pocket  into  any  other  man's  purse, 
but  to  put  money  into  the  national  treasury  —  a 
tariff  for  revenue  only.  I  will  have  nothing  to  do 
here  with  the  question  whether  this  is  the  best  way 
to  raise  our  national  revenue,  nor  whether  our  whole 
system  of  taxation  —  municipal,  State,  and  national 
—  might  not  be  very  much  altered  for  the  better. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         133 

But,  as  things  stand,  both  free-trade  and  high-tariff 
countries  tax  certain  imports ;  and  as  the  United 
States  —  as  well  as  the  rest  of  the  civilized  world  — 
take  this  way  of  raising  revenue,  and  we  are  quite 
certain  to  continue  some  time  longer  in  this  fashion, 
whether  the  Democratic  party  or  the  Republican 
party  is  in  power,  it  seems  to  me  a  mere  waste  of 
time  to  inquire  here  whether  there  be  not  some 
better  way. 

^  "  The  protectionists  accuse  us  in  an  exceedingly 
loose  way  of  holding  very  revolutionary  and  destruc- 
tive doctrines  as  to  how  business  should  be  carried 
on,  and  misstate  our  position,  either  in  plain  terms, 
or,  worse  still,  by  insinuations  which,  if  true,  would 
make  us  all  anarchists,  and  crazy  anarchists  to  boot. 
To  cry  out  '  Free  trade '  has  been  a  favorite  pastime 
with  these  gentlemen,  and  I  am  sorry  that  a  great 
many  otherwise  sensible  people  have  taken  to  the 
woods  and  swamps  of  the  protection  fallacy  for  refuge, 
when  there  was  only  in  free  trade  a  free  gift  in  hand 
for  the  whole  people.  I,  for  one  man,  am  sick  of  this 
whole  business.  I  object  to  this  hue  and  cry — this 
attempt  to  put  opinion  in  the  pillory ;  all  this  smoke 
without  fire  —  raised  against  us.  The  opposite  of 
free  trade  is  slave  trade,  —  restrictive  trade,  bond 
trade,  serf  trade,  helot  trade,  chained  trade,  —  yes, 
slave  trade,  with  the  overseer's  lash  sounding 
through  all  your  halls.  By  this  tariff,  as  our  buying, 
selling,  and  working  now  go  on,  we  are  made  fellow- 
slaves  to  a  hundred  monopolies ;  lackeys  to  a  Penn- 


134  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

sylvania  coal  pit;   serfs  to  a  Syracuse  salt  spring; 

abjects  to  a  sugar  trust;  minions  of  Wisconsin  and 

Minnesota  lumber  yards ;  fellow-citizens    in  paying 

debts  we  never  incurred,  to  swell  a  purse  that  was 

never  honest;  equal  only  as  we  are  alike  subject  to 

a  common  wrong  and  a  common  hurt.     I  say  all  this 

when  I  repeat  this  tariff  is  unconstitutional,  as  the 

/  Supreme  Court  has  already  decided. V  Free  trade  is 

I  simply  a  way  to  raise  revenue  by  a  tariff  for  revenue 

I  only — in  a  way  as  equal  and  just  to  every  honest 

^man  as  possible  at  present." 

"Then  would  you  kill  this  tariff  altogether?" 
asked  one  of  the  elder  men. 

"  I  suppose  you  mean  to  ask  me  whether  I  would 
sweep  away  this  spook  and  ghost  of  protection  out 
of  the  tariff  and  all  at  once,  for  I  have  just  told  you 
our  need  of  a  tariff  for  revenue.  To  reform  is  never 
to  destroy,  and  all  true  reform  attempts  to  remove 
an  evil,  not  a  good,  and  never  wishes  to  destroy  good 
and  bad  together.  Now  what  I  would  do  is  of  no 
great  importance  to  any  one  except  as  he  finds  my 
opinion  to  be  just  and  wise.  I  am  not  in  politics, 
nor  is  the  tariff  issue  in  my  keeping.  But  one 
thing,  I  am  sure,  is  necessary.  Our  struggle  with  the 
slave  trade  of  protection  is  going  to  be  long  and 
bitter.  No  abuse  that  has  had  money  in  it  for  the 
abusers  has  ever  been  voluntarily  given  up.  It  was 
never  seen  among  men  that  any  set  of  men  having  a 
monopoly  of  money-making,  from  Congo  negro  steal- 
ing to  a  Boston  sugar  trust,  ever  gave  up  their  ad- 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         135 

vantage  of  their  own  fr$e-will  or  until  somebody 
forced  them  to  end.  That  rule,  I  am  sure,  will  hold 
with  those  overlords  of  our  American  industries  — 
the  monopolists.  They  must  be  forced  to  let  go. 
They  must  have  a  ticket  of  leave  given  them  to  dis- 
appear, with  the  police  of  a  vigilant  citizenship  to 
keep  strict  run  of  them.  If  you  do  not  break  their 
hold,  you  will  be  held.  To  break  that  hold,  the 
people  must  be  instructed  before  they  are  marshalled 
at  the  ballot-box,  where  under  our  laws  our  national 
policy  is  ordered.  In  this  instruction  brains  and 
honor  must  be  kneaded  together.  We  must  have  no 
shuffling,  no  evasive,  no  dubious  arguments.  When 
that  is  done,  protection,  with  all  its  fallacies  and  rob- 
beries, is  doomed,  whether  the  doom-day  be  close  or 
far.  A  great  reform  must  know,  beyond  any  shade 
of  doubt,  what  it  strikes,  why  it  strikes,  and  how  to 
strike.  Then  the  blow  is  bold  and  home.  When 
you  have  convinced  the  American  nation  —  I  mean 
the  rank  and  file  of  it  —  that  the  whole  protection 
theory  is  a  fallacy,  a  delusion,  and  a  snare,  its  days 
are  numbered.  It  is  a  matter  of  vastly  less  impor- 
tance on  what  particular  day  the  people's  verdict  is 
carried  out. 

"Now,  to  apply  this  to  'practical  politics.'  The 
party  which  crosses  the  trend  of  its  own  principles 
perishes.  But  every  party  may  choose  with  what 
haste  or  delay,  or  in  what  fashion  it  will  carry  out 
its  principles.  In  the  case  of  the  Democratic  party 
which  now  is,  confronted  as  it  is  by  an  unscrupulous 


136  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

opposition,  given  to  every  form  of  misstatement  and 
accusation,  and  alert  to  take  advantage  of  the  Demo- 
cratic virtues  of  frankness  and  justice  in  dealing  with 
the  people,  it  is  inevitable  and  reasonable,  even  on 
the  ground  of  honest  politics,  that  it  should  go  slowly 
and  with  caution  in  making  tariff  changes,  wait 
patiently  for  the  people  whom  it  must  instruct  in  cor- 
rect tariff  principles  before  it  can  win  or  be  entitled 
to  the  victory,  and  thereb}^  give  a  part  of  good  to  the 
nation,  where  in  attempting  to  give  the  whole  it 
might  for  four  years  lose  all.  This  is  a  well-recog- 
nized rule  of  statesmanship  over  the  civilized  world. 
But  one  thing  the  Democratic  party  cannot  afford  to 
do  and  will  not  do.  It  cannot  afford  to  obscure  the 
foundations  on  which  it  builds  its  national  policy  of 
a  tariff  for  revenue  only.  It  must  affirm  that  this 
whole  protection  business  is  an  absurdity  and  a 
fraud  —  expensive,  needless,  unnatural ;  a  chain  on 
the  right  hand  of  labor  and  a  thief's  hand  in  the 
pocket  of  even  the  honest  manufacturers  themselves. 
In  other  words,  it  must  go  up  to  the  fact,  and,  stand- 
ing by  it,  pour  all  the  light  it  can  upon  it.  The 
Democratic  party  has  already  given  ample  guarantees 
of  a  conservative  policy  in  the  future,  in  all  the 
patient  but  firm  utterances  of  its  great  chief,  Grover 
Cleveland,1  in  his  tariff  messages,  and  in  its  late  form- 
ulated bill  for  tariff  reform,  known  as  the  Mills  Bill. 
This  care  and  patience  were  indeed  owed  to  national 
interests,  which  have  a  right  even  in  reform  to  a  judi- 
cious and  well-timed  moderation  in  every  patriotic 

1  See  note,  p.  251. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         137 

and  honest  administration.  But  one  thing  I  deny, 
here  and  everywhere,  for  myself  and  the  men  who 
agree  with  me.  I  deny  that  the  monopolists,  as 
such,  and  their  Washington  lobby  have  any  claim  to 
forbearance,  to  a  reprieve,  or  a  right  to  anything  ex- 
cept" what  they  have  power  to  take  out  of  their  own 
past  conduct  and  their  present  attitude.  They  are 
entitled  to  their  'pound  of  flesh,'  if  it  be  theirs;  but 
no  hide  nor  hair  nor  mote  of  flesh  more.  They  will 
need  all  they  have  got,  fair  or  foul,  before  they  are 
departed  on  their  tariff  bier  to  the  final  rest  of  the 
unjust.  For  look !  When  the  Democratic  party, 
in  a  way  of  conservative  tariff  reform,  offered  the 
country  the  Mills  Bill,  which  reduced  tariff  taxes 
only  from  5  to  7  per  cent  on  an  average,  and  which 
left  our  tariff  then  higher  than  the  American  tariffs, 
under  which  our  country  had  grown  up,  had  been 
for  some  66  years  out  of  the  90  years  since  our  first 
tariff  in  1789,  they  set  their  pack  to  bay  at  them  as 
free  traders  bought  with  English  gold.  If  the  Mills 
Bill  made  a  free-trade  tariff,  then  I  say  the  American 
tariffs  for  66  years  have  been  free-trade  tariffs,  and 
that  free-trade  tariffs  are  the  traditional  policy  of 
the  Republic,  and  that  the  present  protective  tariff  is 
an  innovation  against  American  precedent,  which, 
having  been  put  on  trial  and  found  wanting,  must 
now  go  out  as  an  expensive  novelty  which  is  not  'a 
success.'1  I  think,  moreover,  that  the  behavior  of 
certain  Republican  leaders  towards  the  Mills  Bill 
furnishes  proof,  if  any  were  needed,  that  they  feel 

1  See  note,  p.  253. 


138  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

themselves  standing  on  a  quagmire,  which  any  hour 
may  sink  them  in  the  mud,  and  still  that  they  must 
stand  where  they  are,  and  either  go  up  or  under. 
For  them,  as  Macbeth  says,  'Returning  were  as 
tedious  as  go  o'er.'  For  if  they  thought  that 
the  Mills  Bill,  with  its  small  average  reduction, 
was  a  blunder  against  our  business  interests,  they 
would  have  allowed  it  to  pass,  because  if  it  had  been 
that,  both  the  Democratic  party  and  tariff  reform 
would  have  been  buried  by  the  disaster  they  had 
created,  beyond  resurrection.  That  would  have 
been  a  cheap  way  for  the  country  and  the  Republi- 
can party  to  be  rid  of  Democrats  and  other  lunatics. 
What  they  apparently  thought  was  this:  'If  the 
people  get  a  taste  of  tariff  reform,  they  will  demand 
some  more;'  and  so  managed  to  send  the  nation 
back  to  its  husks  again,  —  its  State  majorities  being 
won  through  ignorance.  For  the  raw  material  which 
protection  uses  to  create  its  votes,  is  and  must  always 
be,  the  people's  ignorance,  and  this  stock  in  trade  is 
very  rapidly  running  short.  In  a  country  like  ours, 
where  laws  cannot  be  made  without  the  consent  of 
the  governed,  the  public  can  only  be  robbed  after  it 
has  first  been  deceived.  True  reform  never  goes 
back,  and  tariff  reform  is  already  some  distance  along 
its  course. 

"  Of  course  I  would  like  to  bring  you  and  the 
whole  country  to  become  tariff-reformers.  But  I 
have  found  three  classes  of  men,  —  not  large  classes, 
I  am  happy  to  say  —  in  this  community,  with  whom 


OR,    OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES:        139 

I  have  had  bad  luck.  The  first  class  remind  me  of  a 
buzz-saw  in  motion  and  a  lunatic  all  in  one.  Set  a 
man  of  this  sort  going  with  a  modest  suggestion  of 
reform,  and  he  breaks  out  against  you  with  a  swift 
harangue,  all  over  teeth  which  he  calls  arguments, 
which,  whether  that  man's  position  be  right  or 
wrong,  has  no  sequence,  coherency,  or  connection 
with  much  in  this  world  or  the  next,  and  you  are 
glad  to  get  rid  of  the  buzz.  The  teeth  are  only 
paste.  Such  a  man,  in  his  explosion  of  chaotic 
utterances,  refutes  multiplication  easily,  sets  addi- 
tion and  subtraction  by  the  ears  most  graciously, 
makes  division  drive  out  fractions  very  sternly,  and 
becomes  himself  a  sphere,  a  solid  globe  of  indescrib- 
able absurdities.  Or  you  have  heard,  possibly,  a 
poor  lunatic,  when  somebody  comes  into  the  room, 
say,  ;  This  is  John.'  You  answer,  '  John  is  dead  ten 
3rears  ago  ; '  '  John  is  a  hundred  miles  away ; '  '  John 
has  gone  to  sea ; '  4  This  is  James ; '  or,  '  This  is 
William.'  To  all  your  statements  comes  back  the 
sad  reiteration  of  the  mindless  invalid,  6  This  is 
John.'  Nobody  ever  convinces  a  buzz-saw  or  such 
a  mental  invalid  as  goes  round  saying  'Protection 
is  right,  because  it  is  right.'  Then,  as  a  second 
class,  I  have  met  some  men  who  say,  'We  agree  with 
you  that  free  trade  is  right  in  principle,  but  it  is 
wrong  in  practice.'  But  what  is  a  principle  but  the 
statement  of  a  law  derived  from  facts  ?  And  then,  in 
the  third  place,  there  is  the  man  who  says,  CI  agree 
that  free  trade  is  right,  but  this  is  too  soon  to  begin 


140  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

to  change  the  tariff.'  Such  a  man  would  come  late 
to  the  day  of  judgment,  unless  he  were  well  policed 
on  his  way  thereto,  and  compelled  for  once  in  his 
life  to  be  on  time.  And  still  I  find  another  man,  in 
this  same  class,  who  says,  '  This  tariff  may  be  unjust, 
but  it  has  stood  so  long,  so  many  interests  are  so 
bound  up  with  it,  there's  so  much  trouble  altering  it, 
that  we  had  best  let  it  alone.'  Monopoly  has  been 
allowed  so  long  that  any  man  is  wrong  to  meddle. 
I  might  answer,  this  tariff  has  stood  only  twenty-five 
years  out  of  one  hundred  since  the  country  was  ; 
that  the  honest  interests  of  trade  and  labor  go  with 
us,  and  that  troubles  are  sure  to  be  a  thousand  times 
more  multiplied  if  we  don't  dry  up  the  fountain  than 
if  we  do. 

" I  will  only  answer  this:  Wrong  is  wrong,  and  a 
right  man  will  never  have  fellowship  with  it;  and 
that  it  is  a  queer  argument  to  say  that  because  an 
abuse  has  managed  to  live  ten  years,  and  the  abusers 
have  made  millions  by  it,  therefore  both  ought  to  be 
let  go  on  forever. 

"  Free  trade,  then,  submits  these  statements,  among 
others,  for  its  foundation  principles:  To  trade  free 
is  the  natural  condition  of  man  ;  restrictive  trade  is 
always  artificial;  men  can  regulate  their  own  buying 
and  selling  better  than  the  state  can,  and  should 
therefore  be  let  alone.  All  commerce,  or  trade,  is 
an  exchange  of  commodities,  a  barter,  in  short,  and 
every  country  should  be  let  buy  in  the  cheapest 
market  and  sell  in  the  dearest.  If  a  nation  won't 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS    TAXES.        141 

buy  of  its  neighbors,  its  neighbors  won't  buy  of  it. 
No  imports  mean  no  exports,  and  no  home  market 
can  take  all  its  home  goods.  Reciprocity  of  trade 
means  prosperity  of  trade.  Natural  law  has  for- 
bidden that  any  nation  shall  own  the  whole  earth 
for  its  own  market,  to  the  exclusion  of  all  other  na- 
tions. It  is  wise,  therefore,  in  nations  to  exchange 
their  goods  between  each  other  with  the  smallest 
restraint  and  friction  possible.  Scarcity  of  anything 
which  the  human  race  needs  is  an  evil ;  plenty  is  a 
good.  There  is  a  good  scarcity  and  an  evil  scarcity. 
In  trade,  that  scarcity  is  evil  which  arises  from  plenty 
being  kept  out ;  that  scarcity  is  good  which  arises 
when  demand  runs  beyond  free  supply.  There  is 
also  a  good  plenty  and  an  evil  plenty.  That  plenty 
is  evil  where  supply  outruns  the  demand — a  glutted 
market.  That  plenty  is  good  where  the  industry 
and  prosperity  of  a  country  create  and  consume 
the  plenty  to  create  it  again  —  a  lively  market. 
There  are  also  two  kinds  of  dearness  and  two  kinds 
of  cheapness :  the  bad  dearness  is  where  prices  rise 
from  forced  scarcity ;  a  good  dearness,  where  prices 
are  raised  by  an  over-demand.  The  good  cheapness 
is  from  abundance  ;  the  bad  from  no  demand,  the  ina- 
bility of  consumers  to  purchase.  High  tariffs  create 
the  bad  conditions  in  all  these  cases.  Free  trade 
creates  the  good.  Men  may  be  divided  into  pro- 
ducers and  consumers  —  sellers  and  buyers.  On  the 
surface  these  two  sets  of  men  seem  to  have  antago- 
nistic interests;  in  reality,  the  interest  of  each  is  the 


142  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

true  interest  of  both,  and  they  should  be  left  to 
make  their  own  adjustments.  If  you  hurt  the  con- 
sumer you  hurt  the  producer.  The  prosperity  of 
the  buyer  is  the  prosperity  of  the  seller.  No  mer- 
chant can  profit  from  a  bankrupt  customer.  Sure 
pay,  prompt  pay  delights  him,  and  this  kind  of  pay 
comes  from  his  customers'  prosperity.  Trade  be- 
tween two  men  or  nations  is  not  a  trick  for  one 
man's  advantage,  but  a  fair  exchange  for  the  benefit 
of  both.  The  great  free-trader  Bastiat  says  that  the 
protection  fallacy  has  been  maintained  among  men 
by  looking  at  what  the  producer  gains  and  the  con- 
cealment of  what  the  consumer  loses.  Fair  play, 
fair  trade,  in  the  long  run,  always  pay  men  and 
nations  best.  The  protective  system,  falsely  so 
called,  is  everywhere  organized  natural  selfishness, 
which,  in  the  long  run,  breeds  a  disaster  equivalent 
to  its  baseness. 

"  Now,  men,  I  have  had  these  ideas  of  free  trade 
printed  on  these  strips  of  paper,  for  distribution 
among  you.  I  wish  you  would  take  and  examine 
them.  They  will  require  some  care,  but  I  am  sure 
that  you  and  the  mechanics  of  this  nation,  who  can 
look  so  sharply  into  the  working  of  any  machine 
under  their  hands  and  analyze  it,  can  get  at  the 
roots  of  this  tariff  question,  if  you  will  only  set 
about  it." 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS    TAXES.         143 


CHAPTER   IX. 

"  TO-NIGHT,"  said  Mr.  Freeman,  when  he  met  the 
men  again,  "I  am  going  to  cite  my  authorities,  as 
the  lawyers  say,  in  behalf  of  the  plaintiff  in  the  case 
of  Free  Trade  vs.  Protection.  First  of  all,  I  offer 
nearly  all  the  professors  of  political  economy,  here 
and  abroad,  as  witnesses.  I  am  aware  that  it  is  the 
habit  of  protectionists  to  sneer  at  these  gentlemen  as 
mere  theorists  and  not  at  all  acquainted  with  the 
needs  of  business.  We  are  invited  to  study  markets 
rather  than  maxims.  This  protection  sneer  is  un- 
doubtedly due  to  the  fact  that  the  professors  are  not 
on  their  side.  Indeed  I  doubt  if  there  is  a  professor 
of  political  economy  in  the  world,  of  any  considerable 
eminency,  who  goes  with  them.  For  as  long  as  this 
world  turns,  in  the  exact  and  physical  sciences,  math- 
ematics, medicine,  chemistry,  botany,  geology,  and 
the  like,  and  in  law  and  gospel,  to  recognized  author- 
ities, and  asks  the  students  of  a  science  to  explain  it, 
it  will  make  no  exception,  in  tariff  matters,  to  this  rule, 
to  oblige  the  protection  fallacy.  In  other  words,  the 
brain  of  the  educated  world  which  has  made  a  special 
study  of  the  tariff  question  champions  free  trade.1 

uThe  next  authority  I  cite  is  the  history  of  the 
world,  so  far  as  it  concerns  trade  and  commerce. 
This  is  rather  a  voluminous  citation,  but  I  will 

1  See  ncte,  p.  254. 


144  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

show  you  the  main  facts  on  which  my  citation  relies, 
first  premising  that,  in  my  judgment,  the  history  of 
the  world's  business  shows  that  whenever  and  wher- 
ever business  has  been  made  free,  it  has  been  made 
prosperous.  Take,  for  instance,  the  case  of  Holland 
—  a  country  of  about  400,000  acres  of  land  which 
could  be  ploughed,  the  rest  being  marshes,  and  a  pop- 
ulation of  less  than  2,000,000  to  begin  with.  Having 
fought  herself  free  from  combined  Spain,  France, 
and  Germany,  she  adopted  the  business  habits  of 
freemen  —  'trade  unfettered,  unimpeded,  and  un- 
legislated  upon,'  —  while  all  the  rest  of  the  world 
(England  under  her  aristocracy  included)  chained 
up  their  prosperity  with  protective  tariffs.  Under 
free-trade  conditions,  she  was  at  one  time  the  domi- 
nant naval  power  of  the  world.  '  Though  not  rais- 
ing a  bushel  of  wheat,  Holland  became  the  best 
place  for  Europe  to  buy  grain ;  though  she  did  not 
possess  an  acre  of  forests,  there  was  always  more  and 
better  timber  to  be  obtained  in  her  ports  than  else- 
where ;  and  though  she  smelted  no  iron  and  did  not 
raise  a  sheaf  of  hemp,  her  fleets  became  the  best 
that  sailed  the  seas ; '  and  all  c  because,'  to  use  the 
words  of  one  of  her  statesmen  in  1745,  c  she  had  the 
wealth  to  pay  for  these  commodities,  and  possessed 
this  wealth  because  trade  and  all  exchanges  were 
left  unimpeded.'  1 

"  Take  the   case  of  Belgium,  her  next  neighbor. 
Under  Napoleon  Bonaparte,  by  military  rule, '  protec- 

1  David  A.  Wells :  Article  on  Free  Trade.    Lalor's  Cyclopaedia  of 
Political  Science,  vol.  II.  p.  310. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         145 

tion '  was  carried  to  that  degree  that  the  importation 
of  all  foreign  goods  was  forbidden,  and  all  such 
goods,  when  found  in  the  country,  were  burned,  and 
the  man  who  imported  them  was  quickly  and  severely 
punished.  Under  this  system,  when  Holland  resumed 
sovereignty,  in  1814,  after  Napoleon's  defeat  at 
Waterloo,  the  country  had  become  desolate,  and,  to 
a  considerable  degree,  depopulated.  The  Dutch 
ordered  a  low  duty,  of  3  per  cent  on  raw  material 
and  6  per  cent  on  manufactured  articles.  Manufac- 
tures now  sprang  up  again.  But  the  Dutch  and 
Belgians  were  never  friends,  and  after  their  separa- 
tion in  1830  Belgium,  partly  to  spite  Holland,  went 
back  to  a  high  protective  tariff.  But  in  1851  the  Bel- 
gian minister  of  finance  declared  in  parliament  that 
this  tariff  was  destroying  Belgian  industries,  and  in 
1855,  with  the  consent  of  nearly  every  one,  this  tariff 
was  swept  away  and  a  tariff  for  revenue  only  took 
its  place.  The  results  have  been  simply  marvellous. 
With  a  territory  of  about  11,000  square  miles  (about 
the  size  of  Connecticut  and  Massachusetts)  — only 
one-half  tillage  land ;  a  standing  army  double  that 
of  the  United  States ;  a  population,  in  1876,  of  a 
little  over  5,000,000,  and  backed  by  hardly  any 
national  resources  except  a  few  coal  and  iron  mines, 
and  Belgium  maintains  the  most  dense  population  in 
Europe;  enjoyed  in  1880  a  revenue  of  $57,000,000, 
of  which  only  $3,600,000.  came  from  customs ;  has 
the  greatest  diversity  of  textile  manufactures,  uses 
more  silk  than  any  other  country;  has  an  export 


146  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

and  import  commerce  that  increased  fourfold  from 
1861  to  1870,  and  for  the  year  1878  rose  to  1498,000,000 
exclusive  of  $254,000,000  of  transit  exports  and  im- 
ports to  and  from  other  countries.  The  protection- 
ist very  seldom  talks  of  Belgium.  It  is  a  very  little 
place,  —  would  be  lost  in  Texas,  —  has  'its  pauper 
labor,'  I  suppose,  and  yet,  perhaps,  you  and  every 
other  American  citizen,  except  he  be  a  monopolist, 
can  pick  up  a  little  wisdom  out  of  its  statistics. 

"  Then  there  are  the  two  Australian  colonies  of 
New  South  Wales  and  Victoria ;  the  first  a  free- 
trade  country  and  the  other  with  a  high  tariff. 
They  are  almost  side  by  side ;  have  about  the  same 
soil  and  climate ;  the  same  kind  of  population,  and 
began  with  about  the  same  capital  or  wealth ;  agri- 
cultural and  mining  communities  with  a  sprinkling 
of  manufactures,  all  '  infant  industries '  as  must  be 
in  colonies  not  a  hundred  years  old.  I  have  studied 
their  statistics,  and  I  fail  to  see  why  in  all  which 
concerns  wealth  and  the  people's  comfort  free-trade 
New  South  Wales  ha£  riot  greatly  outstripped  her 
4  protected  '  sister  of  Victoria. l 

"  In  the  next  place,  I  cite  the  history  of  business 
in  free-trade  England.  I  am  aware  that  all  the 
cheap  protection  politicians  think  they  take  some- 
thing in  their  net  by  calling  us  free-traders  English- 
men and  riot  Americans,  and  charge  us  with  wishing 
to  destroy  our  own  American  industries.  I  suppose 
it  probable  that  Democrats  own  a  full  half  of  the 
wealth  of  the  United  States  and  are  engaged  in 

1  See  note,  p.  257. 


OR,  OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.        147 

manufacturing  as  well  as  Republicans,  and  they 
certainly  cannot  intend  to  destroy  their  own  prop- 
erty. I  suppose,  further,  that  these  same  tariff  men 
would  have  been  very  ready  to  quote  England's  ex- 
ample if  free  trade  there  had  proved  a  failure ;  and  I 
furthermore  suppose  that  her  example  is  railed 
against  and  belittled  by  these  same  gentlemen  just  as 
the  testimony  of  the  free-trade  professors  is,  because 
both  go  dead  against  the  protection  fallacy.  I  am 
at  the  same  time  aware  that  this  false  hue  and  cry 
has  gained  them  some  votes  in  the  last  election, 
especially  among  that  warm-hearted  Irish  race  who 
have  reason  not  to  love  England,  or,  rather,  I  should 
say,  the  Tory,  aristocratic,  mediaeval,  old-time  'corn- 
laws  '  class  of  Englishmen.  All  peoples  are  by  nature 
friends.  Privileged,  '  protected  '  classes  never  were 
and  never  can  be  the  people's  friends,  but  are  by 
their  very  position  exclusive,  careless,  cruel  towards 
the  masses.  The  flatulent  demagogues  of  protec- 
tion told  us  in  the  last  election  and  they  will  tell 
you  so  again  in  contempt  of  your  intelligence,  that 
free  trade  is  an  English  notion,  with  which  Ameri- 
cans should  never  meddle. 

"  It  no  more  belongs  exclusively  to  England  thai! 
the  multiplication  table  does,  than  air  or  light  or 
heat  does ;  it  belongs  by  the  laws  of  Nature  to  every 
people  wise  enough  to  accept  it  and  profit  by  it,  as 
the  true  law  of  human  civilization  and  progress. 
The  sun  is  not  England's,  but  the  world's;  and 
so  is  free  trade.  The  question  for  us  is  not  what 


148  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

England  thinks,  but  what  we  need.  Will  you  throw 
away  a  thing  because  England  has  it?  Throw  away, 
then,  the  English  language  and  speak  the  Cherokee 
or  Mohawk  or  Sioux  dialects,  which  are  about  the 
only  native  American  languages  still  extant.  Will 
you  decline  to  do  what  England  does?  Breathe 
through  your  ears,  then,  because  Englishmen  breathe 
through  lungs.  Become  honest,  and  cease  to  use 
English  inventions,  to  drink  English  ales,  to  patron- 
ize English  blondes,  at  your  theatres,  clad  in  gauze 
as  thin  as  your  own  protection  arguments;  and  con- 
trive to  let  out,  some  way,  the  English  blood  that 
courses  through  the  veins  of  so  many  of  you.  Yes, 
and  those  of  you  in  Congress  who  are  trying  to  save 
their  plunder  to  your  accomplices  in  this  gigantic 
tariff  steal,  by  your  official  oratory  and  vote  ;  you 
who  are  so  American  that  you  would  not  share  in  a 
universal  good  if  it  came  through  an  English  channel; 
you  who  should  refuse  to  use  the  English  common 
law  because  it  comes  out  of  a  thousand  years  of 
England's  strife  for  life  and  liberty,  be  pleased  to 
cease  parading  in  the  cast-off  clothes  of  a  refuted 
and  vanquished  English  aristocracy  before  the  free- 
men of  our  great  Republic,  whenever  you  use  with 
great  servility  of  imitation  the  protection  arguments 
of  English  dukes  and  overlords  heard  sixty  years 
ago,  when  the  English  people,  with  the  grim  threat 
of  civil  war,  wrested  their  comfort  and  commer- 
cial liberty  out  of  the  twin  hands  of  Monopoly 
and  Privilege  and  called  their  victory  Free  Trade. 


OR,    OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.        149 

You  must  think  the  American  people  a  stupid  lot 
when  you  offer  them  such  cant,  which  thinly  veils 
such  greediness  as  yours.  Free  trade  is  English 
only  so  far  as  justice,  common-sense,  and  wisdom 
are  —  it  is  only  that  England  has  had  the  wit  to 
take  her  share  of  a  common  blessing  which  you 
would  have  the  United  States  reject,  although  its 
birthright. 

"Now  for  the  English  testimony  to  free  trade  for 
us  and  everybody  as  conveying  a  blessing.  England 
had  been  a  'protected'  country,  full  of  monopolies, 
for  a  thousand  years  and  more.  The  people,  led 
by  men  like  John  Bright  and  Richard  Cobden,  made 
it  a  free-trade  country  against  the  will  of  the  privi- 
leged classes —  an  experiment  then  untried.  As  a 
free-trade  country  it  has  surpassed  all  others  in  all 
things  which  pertain  to  national  wealth.  The  com- 
mercial strength  of  England,  which  American  pro- 
tectionists say  they  fear  as  overwhelming  us  if  we  let 
down  the  tariff  bars,  has  been  developed  under  free 
trade  and  by  it.  America  in  two  wars  did  not  quail 
before  English  guns,  nor  is  there  any  reason  why  she 
should  quail  before  English  looms,  English  furnaces, 
English  shipping,  English  'pauper  labor,'  which  is 
sometimes  better  paid  than  our  own,  nor  anything 
English.  We  are  citizens  of  a  land  richer  in  every- 
thing which  creates  wealth  than  England  can  be. 
This  the  best  minds  of  England  know  and  say. 

"  But  now  look  at  England's  prosperity  under  free 
trade.  I  shall  quote  my  statistigs-^UUia  speech  of 


150  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

Mr.  Gladstone  at  Leeds,  in  1881,  because  he  is  more 
responsible  than  most  for  what  he  says,  and  because 
as  a  member  of  Sir  Robert  Peel's  cabinet  he  shared 
with  his  great  chief  and  statesmen  like  Sir  James 
Graham,  the  honor  in  the  Corn-Laws  struggle  of 
stating  publicly  in  the  House  of  Commons  that  he 
had  been  wrong;  that  he  had  changed  his  mind;  that 
he  had  come  to  regard  the  whole  protection  system  as 
a  curse  to  England,  and  was  henceforth  a  free-trader 
both  by  experience  and  conviction.  Mr.  Gladstone 
says,  among  other  things,  'I  express  the  opinion  that 
no  government  that  can  exist  in  this  country  will 
either  soon  or  late  pledge  its  responsibility  to  any 
proposals  for  restoring  protection  duties.  You 
might  as  well  attempt  to  overthrow  any  institution 
of  this  country  as  to  overthrow  the  free-trade  legis- 
lation.' He  elsewhere  in  the  same  speech  expresses 
his  conviction  'that  the  great  legislation  [free- 
trade]  which  marked  the  lifetime  of  Sir  Robert  Peel 
and  of  Mr.  Cobden  rests  upon  such  foundations 
that  nothing  can  shake  it,  and  that  all  things  said 
against  it  are  as  the  idle  breeze  against  the  stone 
walls  of  the  building  within  which  we  stand.'  '  The 
true  idea  of  commerce,'  he  says,  'is  founded  upon 
the  principle  that  in  the  operation  of  commerce  it  is 
absolutely  impossible  for  a  country  to  do  good  to 
itself  without  at  the  same  time  doing  good  to  other 
people.'  It  is  upon  this  principle,  I  suppose,  that  all 
our  English  friends  wish  free  trade"  with  us  —  as  a 
mutual  advantage,  since  good  trade  for  the  United 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         151 

States  would  mean  good  trade  for  England.  ;  Fair 
play'  is  paying  play  as  between  men  and  between 
nations.  He  says,  '  1840  was  the  last  year  in  which 
the  protective  system  enjoyed  perfect  peace.  From 
1800  to  1840  population  increased  more  than  wealth, 
and  wealth  went  into  fewer  hands.  In  1841  our 
population  was  26,500,000 ;  in  1881,  35,000,000,  an 
increase  of  33  per  cent ;  from  1842  to  1880  wealth 
had  increased  over  130  per  cent.  In  1840  exports 
were  £51,000,000;  in  1880,  £223,000,000;  or,  popu- 
lation had  grown  33  per  cent  and  exports  340  per 
cent;  savings-bank  deposits  in  1840,  £24,000,000 ;  in 
1880,  £75,000,000.  Our  ship  tonnage  in  1840  was 
6,000,000  tons;  in  1880,  41,000,000.  Crime  rose 
from  5,000,  plus,  criminals  in  1809,  to  14,000,  plus,  in 
1814,  and  in  1829  to  18,000,  plus.  In  1840  there 
were  34,000  criminal  convictions ;  in  1880  there 
were  only  15,000.  In  1849  there  were  201,000  pau- 
pers in  England  and  Wales ;  in  1880,  only  111,000 
—  a  decrease  of  near  50  per  cent.  Men  argue  free 
trade  merely  as  a  material  question  alone.  It  is  just 
as  strong  in  its  political,  social,  and  moral  aspects  as 
in  its  operation  iipon  the  production  and  increase  of 
wealth.' 

"  '  I  will  take  our  worst  year  —  1879.  We  had 
£612,000,000  of  trade  pass  through  our  hands,  with 
a  population  of  35,000,000.  The  same  year  the 
German  Empire,  with  a  population  of  40,000,000, 
had  £371,000,000  of  trade.  The  United  States, 
with  50,000,000  of  people,  had  £239,000,000  of 


152  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

trade,  a  large  part  of  it  coming  to  England  in  the 
shape  of  food  and  provisions.  Thus  England,  with 
35,000,000,- had  £612,000,000  trade,  while  the  United 
States  and  Germany,  both  highly  protected  coun- 
tries, with  90,000,000  people,  had  £610,000,000  of 
trade.  Take,  again,  three  other  countries,  —  France, 
Russia,  and  Holland,  —  with  a  total  population  of 
121,000,000  and  with  a  total  trade  of  £612,000,000 
—  exactly  the  amount  of  trade  England  had  in  the 
disastrous  year  1879  with  a  people  of  35,000,000. 
Now  we  are  told  that  America  is  pursuing  a  course 
of  profound  wisdom  in  regard  to  its  protective  sys- 
tem, and  that  under  the  blessed  shelter  of  a  system 
of  that  kind  the  tender  infancy  of  trades  is  cher- 
ished, which  afterwards,  having  obtained  vigor,  will 
go  forth  into  neutral  markets  and  possess  the  world. 
Gentlemen,  is  that  true  ?  Have  the  manufacturers 
of  America  gone  forth  and  possessed  the  world? 
To  the  whole  of  Asia,  Africa,  and  Australasia,  which 
present  to  us  neutral  markets  where  we  meet  Amer- 
ica without  fear  or  favor,  one  way  or  the  other,  the 
whole  exports  of  the  United  States  of  manufactured 
goods  amount  to  £4,751,000;  ours  to  £78,140,000. 
Gentlemen,  the  fact  is  this  —  America  is  a  young 
country  with  enormous  vigor  and  enormous  internal 
resources.  I  say  it,  I  hope,  not  with  disrespect,  but 
with  strong  and  cordial  sympathy,  and  with  much 
regret  —  she  is  committing  errors  of  which  we  set 
her  an  example.  But  from  the  enormous  resources 
of  her  home  market,  the  development  of  which  in- 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.         153 

ternally  is  not  touched  by  protection,  she  is  able  to 
commit  those  errors  with  less  fatal  consequences 
upon  her  people  than  we  experienced  when  we  com- 
mitted them.  I  stated  once  that  the  day  might 
come  when  America  might  claim  to  possess  the  com- 
mercial primacy-  of  the  world.  I  gave  sad  offence 
to  many.  I  know  that  was  an  offence  to  the  vanity 
of  those  who  are  vain  amongst  us.  But  I  think  it 
one  of  the  most  sacred  duties  of  a  public  man  to 
tell  the  things  which  he  thinks  to  be  of  interest  and 
importance,  and  which  may,  perhaps,  convey  a  salu- 
tary warning  to  his  countrymen,  whether  his  coun- 
trymen like  to  hear  them  or  not ;  and  I  will  say  this, 
that  as  long  as  America  adheres  to  the  protective 
system,  your  commercial  primacy  is  secure.  Nothing 
in  the  world  can  wrest  it  from  you  while  America 
continues  to  fetter  her  own  strong  hands  and  arms, 
and  with  these  fettered  arms  is  content  to  compete 
with  you,  who  are  free,  in  neutral  markets.  As  long 
as  America  follows  the  doctrine  of  protection,  you 
are  perfectly  safe  and  you  need  not  allow,  anjr  of 
you,  even  your  lightest  slumbers  to  be  disturbed  by 
the  fear  that  America  will  take  from  you  your  com- 
mercial primacy.'1  Now,  then,  this  is  the  testimony 
of  a  veteran  statesman  who  for  at  least  fifty  years 
has  seen  arid  studied  the  workings  of  free  trade  over 
the  world.  From  a  young  man  he  has  been  recog- 
nized as  a  master  of  finance,  and  it  is  doubtful 
whether  any  other  English  statesman  ever  put  so 
skilled  and  wise  a  hand  for  so  many  years  to  the 

1  See  note,  p.  263. 


154  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

mercantile  affairs  of  Great  Britain  as  he.  I  have 
heretofore  shown  you  how  this  land  of  ours  is  able, 
from  her  national  riches  and  the  ability  of  her 
mechanics  and  her  business  men,  to  outmatch  the 
world  in  trade.  Unless  it  can  be  shown,  as  it  never 
can  be,  that  this  same  land  has  some  hidden  and 
fatal  flaw  about  her,  as  yet  concealed,  which  renders 
her  incapable  of  using  her  own  resources  for  her  own 
wealth,  I  submit  that  free-trade  England  has  con- 
tinued for  half  a  century  as  an  historical  object-les- 
son to  teach  us  Americans  that  the  way  to  come  to 
our  own  proper  magnitude  among  the  peoples  of  the 
world  who  buy  and  sell  is  the  way  of  unrestricted, 
unchained  free  trade. 

"  In  the  last  place,  I  submit  the  experience  and  ex- 
ample in  late  years  of  all  the  protected  countries  in 
Europe;  simply  reminding  you  that  they  are  and 
are  to  be  our  competitors  for  the  markets  of  the 
world.  Of  course,  in  the  old  days  they  were,  for 
more  than  a  thousand  years,  protection  nations — for 
the  same  reason  that  they  were  nations  under  tyrants 
and  privileged  classes  —  because  they  knew  and  could 
follow  no  better  way.  But  after  England  broke  the 
protection  chains,  and  as  men  and  statesmen  became 
more  civilized,  they  nearly  all  approached  free  trade. 
So  did  the  United  States,  when  in  1857  (by  a  vote  of 
33  to  12  in  the  Senate  and  124  to  71  in  the  House) 
it  reduced  the  average  duty  on  all  imports  to  less  than 
15  per  cent,  and  in  1854  negotiated  a  treaty  with  the 
British  provinces  for  a  free  exchange  of  nearly  all 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         155 

crude  materials  and  mutually  free  fishery  privileges. 
Indeed,  had  not  our  Civil  War  intervened,  it  looked 
as  though  the  country  would  rival  '  Great  Britain  in 
freeing  its  foreign  trade  and  commerce  from  all  re- 
strictions, save  for  revenue  and  sanitary  purposes.' l 
"  In  1860  England  negotiated  with  France  under 
Napoleon  III.  the  famous  free-trade  treaty  of  that 
year,  which  among  other  benefits  undoubtedly  held 
the  two  countries  on  more  than  one  occasion  from 
going  to  war.  Following  this  Anglo-French  treaty 
came  twenty-seven  others,  even  Russia  joining  in  the 
movement,  so  that  by  1870,  all  the  great  trading 
nations  of  Europe  had  become  one  great  inter- 
national body  engaged  in  substantially  a  trade  that 
was  free  from  'Protection.'  This  was  the  era  when 
railroads  and  such  stupendous  engineering  operations 
as  the  St.  Gothard  Tunnel  were  carried  through  in 
order  to  assist  exchanges  between  the  nations.  That 
this  liberation  of  trade  from  obstructive  tariffs 
helped  it  amazingly  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the 
trade  of  the  six  nations,  Austria,  Belgium,  France, 
Holland,  Italy,  and  Great  Britain,  from  1860  to  1873 
increased  more  than  100  per  cent,  while  their  aggre- 
gate population  during  the  same  period  increased  but 
7.8  per  cent.  The  Chambers  of  Commerce  and  various 
industrial  bodies  in  France,  testified  in  answer  to  the 
inquiry  of  the  French  government  in  1875,  to  the 
great  benefit  which  accrued  to  French  trade  and 
industries  from  these  commercial  treaties,  and  almost 

1  Recent  Economic  Changes:  D.  A.  Wells;  p.  261. 


156  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

universally  expressed  the  wish  that,  upon  the  expira- 
tion of  these  treaties,  they  might  be  renewed  upon 
even  a  more  liberal  basis.  It  is  thought  that  if  the 
same  inquiry  had  been  made  of  the  same  bodies  in 
every  country  of  Europe,  the  answer  would,  at  that 
time,  have  been  the  same.  Then  came,  in  1873,  a 
commercial  crisis  over  the  world,  and  a  consequent 
universal  depression  of  trade  and  industry,  caused,  as 
I  have  before  told  you,  by  new  inventions,  new  ways 
of  commerce,  like  the  Suez  Canal,  —  a  crisis  which  has 
brought  the  world  lower  prices  in  nearly  everything 
but  labor  prices,  lower  prices  which  have  come  to 
stay,  but  which,  at  the  start,  created  a  commercial 
distress  very  like  the  'growing  pains'  in  a  boy,  for 
instance,  but  also  predict  greater  comfort  for  the 
world,  and  the  prediction  is  now  being  rapidly  ful- 
filled. It  is  now  generally  agreed  by  the  students 
of  political  economy,  both  here  and  abroad,  that  the 
causes  of  this  crisis  lay  behind  free  trade,  or  any  other 
kind  of  trade.  It  should  be  noted,  however,  that 
this  crisis  came  to  free-trade  England  some  three 
years  after  it  came  to  us,  and  that  she  bore  it  better 
than  any  other  country.  All  this,  however,  was  not 
seen  by  the  nations  of  continental  Europe,  who,  sup- 
posing their  commercial  distress  to  be  caused  by 
their  then  almost  free  trade,  reacted  towards  high 
tariffs,  Russia  leading  the  way  in  1877  with  a  tariff 
almost  prohibitory  and  one  of  the  highest  known  to 
modern  civilization,  as  befits  a  semi-barbaric  and 
slave  nation.  She  was  followed  by  Italy  and  Aus- 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         157 

tria  in  1878;  by  Germany  in  1879;  France  in  1881; 
Switzerland  in  1885;  Canada  in  1879  and  in  1887: 
Roumania  in  1886,  and  so  on.  Spain,  which  in- 
creased her  foreign  commerce  fourfold  under  a  liberal 
commercial  policy  in  1869,  has  now  a  tariff  so  high 
that  the  only  relief  comes  from  the  smuggler,  whose 
profession  is  becoming  almost  as  well  established  in 
Spain,  France,  and  Italy  as  it  was  in  the  Dark  Ages, 
when  but  for  him,  according  to  one  authority,  com- 
merce would  have  well-nigh  perished.  The  re-action 
towards  protection,  owing  to  the  general  commercial 
distress,  even  affected  level-headed  Englishmen  and 
Dutchmen,  and  laid  the  foundation  for  the  'Fair- 
Trade  '  argument  of  some  Englishmen  to-day,  which 
Mr.  Gladstone  answered  in  his  speech  at  Leeds  in 
1881,  and  on  several  occasions  since. 

"  Now,  then,  how  lias  this  re-action  towards  protec- 
tion and  high  tariffs  turned  out  on  the  continent? 
It  has  simply  made  things  worse,  as  the  protection 
fallacy  always  must ;  it  has  entangled  and  bound 
every  protected  country  in  Europe  in  the  unendura- 
ble meshes  of  its  own  laws.  But  before  I  show  you 
that,  I  wish  to  remind  you  of  one  powerful  fact  that 
rules  over  the  destinies  of  all  our  industrial  competi- 
tors on  the  continent  of  Europe.  I  pick  up  this 
fact  before  you  because  I  wish  you  to  see  things  as 
they  are  and  to  study  this  whole  matter  of  the  tariff 
intelligently.  I  consider  myself  in  this  argument  to 
be  retained  by  Truth,  and  not  at  all  by  the  Demo- 
cratic party,  except  so  far  as  in  this  tariff  business 


158  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

that  party  stands  for  truth  and  wisdom  in  handling 
the  tariff  question.  The  fact  I  mean  is  this.  Your 
continental  competitors  in  trade  are  all  of  them 
always  substantially  in  a  state  of  war,  not  of  actual 
war,  but  in  a  state  of  expensive  preparation,  which 
is  next  door  to  it.  Now  when  we  were  at  war  we 
said  to  the  government,  '  Tax  us,  tax  us  enough  to 
pay  the  bills  and  save  the  Union.'  The  government 
heard,  and  we  paid.  But  we  are  now  in  a  state  of 
peace  and  we* mean  to  stay  so.  But  these  European 
nations,  with  their  exhausting  armies,  must  have  ex- 
hausting taxes  or  go  bankrupt.  I  know  that  this 
vast  armament  of  nation  against  nation  in  so-called 
Christian  Europe  is  savage,  cruel,  barbaric,  anti- 
Christian  down  to  its  very  roots,  and  that  it  is  the 
peoples  in  the  power  of  privileged  classes  who  pay 
the  bills  with,  sweat  and  blood.  If  any  peoples 
should  not  be  blamed  for  tariff  taxes  or  any  other,  it 
is  these  European  nations.  Let  me  give  a  few 
statistics.  In  the  armies  and  navies  of  Europe 
to-day,  there  are  more  than  4,000,000  able-bodied 
men,  all  consumers  and  no  producers.  There  are 
over  14,000,000  more  men  in  the  reserves,  armed, 
subject  to  drill,  held  ready  for  service  at  any  mo- 
ment;  altogether  one  man  in  every  twenty-four  of 
the  whole  population.  It  is  estimated  that  it  takes 
the  constant  labor  of  one  peasant  or  of  one  mechanic 
to  equip  and  sustain  one  soldier,  and  that  the  whole 
yearly  cost  of  these  armaments  is  over  a  thousand 
million  dollars,  all  consumed  by  men  who  produce 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         159 

nothing.  The  debt  of  all  Europe,  mainly  from  past 
wars,  was  estimated  in  1887  to  be  over  twenty-two 
billions  of  dollars,  entailing  annual  interest  charge  of 
more  than  one  billion  of  dollars  ($1,000,000,000). 
It  is  agreed,  among  those  who  have  studied  this  sub- 
ject, that  this  vast  armament  and  expense,  unless 
removed,  threatens  the  final  destruction  of  the  whole 
fabric  of  society.  What  I  wish  you  to  see  is  that 
all  these  nations  which  compete  with  you  are  over- 
weighted at  the  start  in  any  race  for  commercial 
supremacy,  and  that  only  the  unwise  policy  of  your 
own  rulers,  whom  you  yourselves  elect,  can  hinder 
America  from  winning. 

"  Now,  then,  let  us  see  how  high  tariffs  —  this 
eternal  shutting  out  and  shutting  in  —  have  worked 
in  Europe.  I  have  already  told  you  how  Italy  taxed 
a  poor  French  corpse  and  its  ashes  the  round  sum  of 
$140  for  coming  in  and  going  out  of  Italy  because 
France  forbids  Italian  fruits  and  flowers;  and  all  the 
rest  is  about  of  that  piece,  silly,  unprofitable,  bar- 
baric, expensive,  useless.  Germany  raises  a  tariff 
wall  against  breadstuffs,  and  Austria  retaliates  against 
Germany  in  the  same  fashion.  Consequently  the 
price  of  breadstuffs  has  fallen  in  both  countries  — 
a  bad  plenty  where  the  masses  have  only  money  to 
buy  a  little.  Exactly  the  same  thing  happens  to 
France  under  a  like  tariff.  Roumania  orders  exces- 
sive discriminating  duties  against  Austrian  goods,  a 
duty,  for  instance,  of  600  francs  (about  $120)  on 
200  pounds  of  shoes.  Austria  sends  her  shoes  and 


160  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

other  wares  to  some  frontier  custom-house  of  Switz- 
erland or  Holland,  pays  the  duties  there  and  so 
'  naturalizes  '  the  goods,  and  then  sends  them,  after  all 
the  transportation  expense,  into  Roumania,  who  re- 
ceives them  as  Dutch  or  Swiss  imports.  Then 
Roumania  reduces  a  little  her  tax  against  Austria  so 
as  to  get  out  of  her  all  she  can. 

"In  1887  Russia  raised  her  duties,  already  very  high, 
against  iron  and  steel,  which  Germany  had  largely 
imported  into  St.  Petersburg.  Germany  for  answer 
raises  her  tariff  against  Russian  wheat,  of  which  she 
had  been  taking  large  quantities.  Grain,  indeed,  is 
the  great  Russian  export ;  but  as  she  shuts  out  for- 
eign imports  in  the  supposed  interest  of  her  manufac- 
tures, ships  to  carry  abroad  her  grain  must  come  in 
ballast,  and  so  her  surplus  grain  must  pay  a  double 
freight  rate  for  the  voyage  to  and  from  Russia,  —  all 
in  the  interests  of  the  Russian  farmers,  Russian  protec- 
tionists would  no  doubt  say.  Then  Russia  has  large 
coal-beds  of  the  best  quality.  She  taxes  heavily  all 
imported  coal,  and  so  coal  is  more  expensive  than  in 
almost  any  other  European  country —  a  back-handed 
help  to  her  manufactures,  you  see ;  and  yet  so  irreg- 
ular is  the  supply  of  domestic  coal  that  many  of  her 
railroads  are  often  obliged  to  buy  the  high-priced 
foreign  coal  and  then  charge  higher  freight  rates  to 
the  public  —  to  the  farmers'  grain  especially.  All 
for  the  farmers.  Who  would  not  live  in  'protected' 
Russia  ?  And  so  the  comedy  of  '  protection '  that 
don't  protect  goes  on  all  over  the  continent. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         161 

"Look,  please,  at  some  more  figures  to  show  the 
working  of  these  '  blessed '  tariffs.  In  Austria  —  one 
of  the  first  to  go  back  to  the  Dark  Ages  in  trade 
—  exports  of  wheat  fell  from  6,000,000  hundred- 
weight, in  1878  to  1,500,000,  plus,  in  1886  ;  in  the 
same  period  her  exports  of  cattle  to  one-fourth  and  of 
pigs  one-half  of  what  they  had  been ;  there  has  been 
a  marked  decline  in  banking  profits  ;  an  increase  in 
mortgages  on  real  property,  and  a  decline  in  the  con- 
sumption of  meat  and  bread,  while  she  is  forced  more 
than  any  other  European  nation  to  consume  her  own 
products  at  home.  The  export  trade  of  Germany 
with  Austria  has  suffered  even  more,  the  decrease  in 
five  years  ending  in  1887  being  70,000,000  florins 
(128,000,000).  Russia's  prohibition  of  German  iron 
and  steel  shut  up  her  Silesia  iron-mills,  and  her  almost 
prohibitory  tariff  against  Russian  grain  has  shut  up 
her  flouring  mills  at  Konigsberg,  where  only  20,000 
tons  came  in  in  1887,  as  against  60,000  in  1884. 
Steel  rails  were  higher  in  1888  in  Germany  than  in 
either  England  or  Belgium  ;  but  the  German  iron 
men  complain  that  because  of  the  tax  on  their  raw 
material  they  can  get  no  foreign  contracts,  but  that 
England  and  Belgium,  despite  her  tariff,  are  invad- 
ing, 'inundating'  Germany  with  their  iron;  German 
exports  of  iron  falling  off  in  the  year  1887-88  under 
her  high  protective  tariff  16  per  cent,  while  her  im- 
ports increased  19  per  cent,  Great  Britain  furnishing 
most  of  these  imports.  The  late  trade  statistics  of 
France,  Italy,  and  Russia  all  show  up  the  same  way  ; 


162  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

only  Russia,  an  agricultural  country,  after  three  fine 
harvests,  finds  her  farmers  as  poor  as  ever,  and  France 
has  had  the  'protection'  baseness,  in  her  colony  of 
Cochin  China,  to  prohibit  by  a  tariff  tax  of  about 
50  per  cent  in  favor  of  French  cotton  mills,  the 
poor,  thin  calico  which  the  natives  were  used  to 
wear,  and  by  consequence  the  importations  have 
fallen  off  45  per  cent  and  the  general  trade  is  greatly 
impaired.  The  prime  minister  of  Austria  is  re- 
ported as  lately  saying  that  6  the  European  states,  by 
their  present  retaliatory  tariffs,  are  doing  them- 
selves more  injury  than  the  most  unrestricted  inter- 
national competition  could  possibly  inflict.'  The 
Austrian  minister  of  commerce  has  also  lately  said, 
6  It  is  important  to  maintain  the  outlets  offered  to 
the  commerce,  agriculture,  and  manufactures  of  the 
country.  Nay,  it  is  desirable  to  increase  these  outlets 
in  various  directions.  But  the  only  way  to  do  this  is 
to  have  with  the  other  powers  treaties  of  commerce 
based  on  stipulated  tariffs.  The  conclusion  of  such 
treaties  is  now  the  work  before  the  government.' 

"The  German  nation  —  I  mean  its  educated  classes 
especially  —  are  in  general  a  sound-thinking  people, 
careful  in  their  conclusions  and  not  apt  to  be  misled. 
Their  political  economists,  I  take  it,  must  have 
always  stood  against  the  protection  fallacies,  but 
there  were  enough  German  statesmen  to  follow  the 
high-tariff  errors  in  1879  to  ensure  the  high  tariff 
under  which  Germany  is  now  suffering.  It  was  then 
argued  that  the  effect  of  such  a  tariff  would  be  a 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         163 

more  equal  distribution  of  wealth.  The  actual  re- 
sult has  been  to  increase  the  strength  of  the  great 
bankers  and  manufacturers,  who,  freed  from  foreign 
competition,  now  exercise  complete  control  of  the 
home  market,  and  by  the  creation  of  a  great  number 
of  c  trusts '  or  c  syndicates  '  have  been  very  success- 
ful in  compelling  the  consumers  to  pay  high  prices. 
This  result  has  been  the  exact  opposite  to  what  has 
meanwhile  happened  in  England,  where  rich  men 
have  become  more  numerous  but  not  richer  individ- 
ually; paupers  are  fewer;  the  laboring  classes  are  indi- 
vidually twice  as  well  off  as  the}r  were  fifty  years  ago. 
"  I  readily  admit  that  under  her  high  tariff  the 
industries  of  Germany  have  made  money.  It  will  be 
always  so  for  a  time,  and  if  there  were  no  reckoning- 
day  when  the  books  are  forced  to  be  balanced,  pro- 
tection would  be  a  very  fine  thing  for  the  manufac- 
turers, and  a  less  bad  thing  for  the  laborers.  But 
the  reckoning-day  does  come,  just  as  sure  as  typhoid 
fever  will  come  from  filth,  or  congestion  of  the  lungs 
from  breathing  coal-gas,  just  as  any  other  law  of 
nature  comes  to  vindicate  itself.  If  a  man  should 
go  into  the  paper  industry,  for  instance,  just  after  a 
high  protective  duty  had  been  put  on  foreign  paper, 
as  our  people  did  some  years  ago,  he  might  carry  out 
a  fortune  with  him  if  he  knew  when  to  get  out.  But 
if  he  stayed  in  too  long,  say  until  the  business  was 
overdone  and  the  market  glutted,  the  last  end  of 
that  man  would  be  worse  than  the  first.  It  is  not 
the  least  of  the  high-tariff  evils  that  it  makes  busi- 


164  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

ness  very  much  a  gambling  operation.  There  can 
be  no  permanent  and  lasting  prosperity  in  any  busi- 
ness which  depends  for  its  stability  on  any  sort  of 
government  support  in  the  nature  of  a  protective  tariff. 
With  the  closeness  of  political  parties  a  few  ignorant 
men  could,  in  Congress,  under  restrictive  duties,  par- 
alyze the  business  interests  of  the  nation.  There  is 
this  further  to  be  said  of  Germany,  which,  until  the 
recent  establishment  of  the  empire,  was  a  rather  large 
collection  of  small  states,  each  with  its  custom-houses 
and  revenue  laws,  —  that  the  present  imperial  tariff, 
bad  as  it  is,  is  less  restrictive,  less  burdensome  on  the 
national  trade,  than  the  old  system.  The  consolida- 
tion of  the  numberless  petty  German  states,  each 
with  its  custom-houses,  into  a  single  empire  with 
substantial  free  trade  between  these  formerly  inde- 
pendent states,  gives  Germany,  notwithstanding  its 
restrictive  foreign  tariff,  the  same  benefits  of  internal 
free  trade  that  our  constitutional  free  trade  between 
the  States  gives  to  this  country.  Nearly  all  the 
German  Chambers  of  Commerce  have  lately  declared 
that  the  tariff  has  been  a  disaster  to  German  trade, 
and  advise  a  return  to  freer  laws. 

"  This,  men,  is  the  case  as  I  submit  it,  against 
the  whole  doctrine  of  protection,  and  against  the 
present  tariff  of  the  United  States.  If  there  is  any 
worth  or  use  in  the  experience  of  other  men  and 
nations,  any  lesson  to  be  gained  from  the  tariff  his- 
tory of  Europe,  it  is  that  the  American  tariff  is 
doomed  and  ought  to  go.  Good-night." 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          165 


CHAPTER   X. 

"  I  WILL  talk  to-night,"  said  Mr.  Freeman,  "on 
sugar  and  ships.  But  first  let  me  tell  you  a  little  story 
to  explain  to  you  why  so  many  sensible  and  honest 
people  still  believe  in  the  protection  humbug.  A 
middle-aged,  well-dressed  man,  at  evening,  sits  on  the 
piazza  of  a  house  he  has  paid  for,  smoking  peace- 
fully his  pipe.  All  the  teamsters  riding  past  and 
home  to  their  stables,  to  put  up  their  horses  for  the 
night,  see  him.  They  think,  fc  How  comfortable  he 
is  !  What  a  lucky  fellow  ! '  That  is  what  they  see  — 
the  Seen.  What  they  see  is  all  there — really  is. 
So  far,  they  are  quite  right.  But  listen.  That  man, 
after  he  has  done  smoking,  will  lay  his  pipe  down  by 
his  chair  and  go  indoors,  and  after  a  little  to  bed. 
Meanwhile,  a  spark  from  his  pipe  has  fallen  through 
the  piazza-chinks  on  some  shavings  the  carpenters  left 
there  when  the  house  was  lately  repaired.  The 
night  breeze  fans  all  into  a  flame.  The  houseTis  on 
fire.  The  man  himself  escapes  with  his  wife;  but 
his  children  perish  in  the  flames.  Nor  is  this  all. 
His  wife,  in  her  hurried  flight  to  a  neighbor's,  takes 
cold  and  dies  in  a  week  from  lung  fever.  The 
house,  moreover,  was  not  insured,  and  is  a  dead  loss 
to  the  owner,  who  is  too  old  to  earn  another.  He 


166  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

breaks  under  his  load  of  misfortunes,  he  has  a  stroke 
of  paralysis,  and  unless  charity  or  some  society  of 
workmen  to  which  he  belongs  feed  him,  he  must  go 
to  the  almshouse.  All  this  was  the  Unseen  to  the 
teamsters.  Was  he  the  lucky  man  as  the  passers-by 
thought  ?  He  certainly  looked  so,  but  was  not,  consid- 
ering both  his  idle  smoking  and  what  came  of  it.  It  is 
just  so  with  the  protection  nonsense.  It  looks  very 
fine  at  the  start,  on  the  surface,  and  that  is  why  so 
many  of  our'people  take  to  the  delusion  ;  but  follow 
it  out  to  its  results  and  it  will  always  be  found  the 
deadly  enemy  to  our  industry  and  prosperity.  The 
protection  wrong  always  tends  towards  the  valley  of 
the  shadow  of  death.  I  wish  now  to  show  3^011  how 
dangerous  it  is  for  us  to  decide  the  case  of  the  tariff 
upon  the  merits  of  its  face  and  pay  no  attention  to 
its  roots  and  its  fruits,  by  saying  something  about 
sugar.  Everybody  knows  sugar  and  all  use  it.  But 
very  few  know  what  tricks  great  nations  have  been 
playing  with  it  and  how  absurdly  they  have  all  been 
hoisted  on  the  spring  of  their  own  trap.  Ordinary 
cane-sugar  grows  in  the  torrid  zone,  where  the  warm 
sun  pours  sweetness  into  the  cane  and  gives  a  great 
gift  to  man.  You  would  naturally  say,  Let  us  have 
this  sun's  gift  of  abundant  sugar  from  where  it 
grows  so  easily,  paying  for  the  labor  which  boils  it 
and  the  freight  that  puts  it  upon  the  markets  of  the 
world,  and  we  will  pay  for  this  torrid  sun  with 
northern  ice,  or  wheat,  or  fish,  or  anything  we  can 
raise,  as  nature  has  given  us.  But  now  that  is  ex- 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.        167 

actly  the  opposite  to  what  the  great  civilized  nations 
of  the  world  (the  United  States  included  and  Eng- 
land excluded)  have  been  doing.  Sugar  can  also 
be  raised  from  beets,  and  beets  grow  in  the  temper- 
ate zones.  So  continental  Europe,  especially  France 
and  Germany,  have  of  late  years  been  trying  to  en- 
courage, 'protect'  the  making  of  beet-root  sugar,  by 
bounties,  indirect  but  sure  taxes,  on  their  own  people 
as  consumers,  which  have  gone  into  the  pockets  of 
their  manufacturers  just  as  so  much  of  our  tariff 
taxes  does. 

"Let  me  tell  you  the  story  briefly  of  this  particu- 
lar silly  but  costly  tariff  steal.  Barbaric  Russia  led 
the  way,  as  was  fit,  back  toward  the  ancient,  mediae- 
val darkness.  Nearly  forty  years  ago  Russia  gave  a 
specific  bounty  on  all  Russian  beet-root  sugar.  Next, 
as  a  substitute  for  this  bounty,  she  put  an  almost 
prohibitory  tariff  tax  on  all  foreign  sugars.  Her 
home  sugar  increased  rapidly  for  years,  and  her 
sugar-refiners  made  large  profits.  Under  the  stim- 
ulus of  a  high  excluding  tariff  in  1881,  the  sugar- 
refiners  produced  just  enough  to  supply  their  home 
market.  In  1882  there  was  an  excess  of  production. 
Prices  began  to  fall  and  sugar-refiners  to  fail. 
They  could  not  export  their  surplus,  because  they 
could  not  compete  in  foreign  markets.  At  home 
they  had  already  a  perfect  'protection,'  and  there 
was  no  more  possible.  They  then  asked  their  govern- 
ment to  give  them  a  bounty  on  their  surplus  sugar 
when  they  exported  it.  The  government  agreed  to 


168  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER  f 

do  this  to  the  extent  of  70,000,000  pounds  yearly  at 
a  cost  to  Russian  taxpayers  of  $1,200,000  each  year, 
and  also  a  remission  of  all  internal  taxes  on  the 
same.  Under  this  arrangement,  in  January,  1886, 
the  Russian  sugar  market  was  found  to  be  hopelessly 
glutted,  and  the  sugar-refiners  begged  for  a  bounty 
on  all  the  sugar  they  chose  to  export.  This  was 
granted  for  a  period  of  six  months,  or  until  July, 
1886.  In  these  months  the  Russian  exporters 
poured  227,000,000  pounds  upon  the  English  and 
Italian  markets,  and  yet  there  remained  at  home  in 
July  105,000,000  pounds  unsold  and  unsalable. 
What  Russia  has  done  since  in  the  sugar  business,  in 
its  war  on  the  business  laws  of  the  world,  I  neither 
know  nor  care.  I  only  know  that  she  is  bound  to 
get  the  worst  of  it  in  this  silly,  miserable  business, 
and  I  cite  Russia  as  an  object-lesson  to  show  you 
how  every  high-protection  business  curses  at  the  end 
everybody,  even  the  protected  manufacturers  them- 
selves. 

"Next  take  the  case  of  Germany.  No  country  in 
the  world  with  a  high  '  protection '  tariff  in  times  of 
peace  is  or  ought  to  be  called  a  civilized  country. 
Germany  went  to  work  this  way.  In  1869  she  said 
to  her  sugar-refiners,  'We  have  a  shrewd  plan  to 
assist  you  and  Germany  at  the  same  time.  We  will 
put  an  internal  tax  on  all  the  sugar  you  produce ; 
first  on  the  beet-root  itself,  and  we  will  calculate 
this  tax  on  the  basis  that  it  takes  12  pounds  of  the 
root  to  make  one  pound  of  sugar,  and  on  all  beet 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.        169 

sugar  you  export  we  will  give  you  a  drawback  or 
bounty  equivalent  to  the  tax  paid  on  the  beets.' 
The  first  thing  the  sugar-refiners  did  was,  by  scien- 
tific processes  and  cultivation,  to  get  more  sugar 
out  of  a  pound  of  beets,  so  that,  whereas  in  1869 
it  took  about  12  pounds  of  root  to  make  one  pound 
of  sugar,  it  took  in  1886  only  8^-  pounds  or 
only  about  three-fourths  as  much  root.  In  other 
words,  the  sugar-refiners  got  a  bounty,  an  absolutely 
free  gift,  on  what  they  thus  saved  by  their  skill  in 
growing  and  extracting  sugar ;  paid  no  internal  rev- 
enue tax  on  about  one-fourth  of  the  roots  consumed, 
and  so  made  large  fortunes  —  out  of  a  6  or  7  per 
cent  net  profit  from  the  sugar  bounty.  Of  course 
production  rose — from  about  50,000,000  pounds  in 
1876  to  600,000,000  pounds  in  1885.  In  1883-84 
Germany  exported  three-fifths  of  her  sugar  product 
at  a  cost  to  her  of  about  18,000,000.  Meanwhile  the 
other  continental  dupes  followed  the  German  plan 
and  offered  higher  bounties  and  so  became  competi- 
tors with  her  in  the  markets  of  the  world  at  the 
expense  of  their  own  taxpayers.  Meanwhile  free- 
trade  England  kept  open  house  for  all  sugars,  and  as 
foreign  governments  had  paid  one  or  two  cents  a 
pound  as  a  gift  to  the  English  consumers,  to  give 
them  cheap  sugar,  England  paid  only  about  one- 
half  what  the  citizens  of  France  and  Germany  paid 
for  sugar,  consuming  more  than  70  pounds  per  head, 
while  Germany  only  consumed  17  pounds  per  head. 
It  is  computed  that  in  this  way  alone  the  English  peo- 


170  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

pie  save  about  $25,000,000  yearly.  Nor  is  this  all. 
The  English  people,  having  been  presented  by  these 
kind  neighbors  with  the  free  gift  of  $25,000,000 
worth  of  sugar,  proceeded  to  use  it  (1886-87)  to 
please  themselves.  All  sugar  manufactures  grew 
immensely ;  they  gave  it  to  their  English  cattle : 
their  scientific  farmers  advised  it  in  certain  cases  to  be 
used  for  manure.  Perhaps  the  loudest  'laugh,'  how- 
ever, comes  in  with  the  'jam'  business  of  Great 
Britain.  In  1884  it  is  computed  that  the  jam  indus- 
try consumed  200,000,000  pounds  of  sugar  (in  1888, 
300,000,000  pounds),  employing  more  than  12,000 
men,  or  double  those  employed  in  British  sugar  re- 
fineries. So  while  England  raises  very  little  of  the 
fruits  which  go  into  'jams,'  but  imports  them  free  of 
duty  from  foreign  lands,  she  took  her  cheap  sugar 
and  with  a  smiling  face  went  out  and  controlled  the 
'jam'  market  of  the  world  and  carries  back  her 
German  sugar,  she  got  for  almost  nothing,  into 
Germany,  and  drives  out  with  their  own  sugar  the 
German  'jam '-makers  from  their  own  markets.  It 
is  said  that  a  large  number  of  English  mechanics  are 
now  using  orange  marmalade  —  usually  a  luxury  — 
to  a  large  extent  instead  of  butter;  and  most  English- 
men have  found  out  what  we  Yankees  haven't,  that 
free  sugar  is  a  good  thing.  Is  it  any  wonder  that 
lately  in  the  German  Reichstag  a  deputy  said,  '  Gen- 
tlemen, I  fear  that  this  system  (meaning  the  bounty 
system)  has  made  us  the  laughing-stock  of  our 
English  cousins'? 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.        171 

"  The  United  States,  too,  have  been  taking  a  hand 
in  this  sugar  business.  We  raised  in  1885  about 
227,000,000  pounds  of  cane  sugar,  and  we  exported 
252,000,000,  plus,  or  about  26,000,000  pounds  more 
than  we  raised,  our  exports  of  refined  sugar  having 
risen  from  22,000,000  pounds,  in  1881,  to  the  amount 
just  mentioned  as  exported  in  1885.  What  is  the 
secret  of  our  great  increase  in  our  sugar  exports  ? 
Simply  this.  This  sugar,  when  it  came  into  the 
country  raw,  paid  the  tariff  duties  and  our  tariff 
laws  gave  a  rebate,  as  it  is  called,  i.e.,  so  much 
money  given  back  on  every  pound  of  this  sugar 
when  exported,  and  this  rebate  was  estimated  by  the 
English  sugar-refiners  (a  sharp  set  of  men  who  know 
sugar)  to  amount  to  39  cents  profit  on  every  hundred 
pounds,  and  our  taxpayers  footed  the  bills.  That 
this  was  so  would  seem  to  be  shown  from  the  fact 
that  when  the  treasury  reduced  the  drawback  on  ex- 
ported sugar  to  17  cents,  the  exports  the  very  next 
year  fell  off  to  164,000,000  pounds,  plus,  and  in  1888 
fell  still  lower  to  34,000,000  pounds,  plus.  The 
United  States  also  practically  give  a  bounty  to 
Sandwich-Islands  sugar  by  admitting  it  free  of  duty, 
while  all  other  sugar  imports  are  taxed,  and  this 
bounty  now  amounts  to  $6,000,000  per  annum." 

"  But  we  never  knowed  about  all  this,  squire," 
interrupted  one  of  his  auditors.  "  We've  hearn  tell 
of  free  coal,  free  iron,  free  wool,  but  we  haven't 
heard  much  about  free  sugar." 

"But  you'll  hear  plenty  more  before  long  about 


172  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

free  sugar,"  replied  Mr.  Freeman  with  a  laugh. 
"  The  fact  is  that  the  sugar  tax  stands  somewhat 
by  itself,  for  the  reason  that  the  sum  total  for  rev- 
enue —  in  other  words,  the  tax  on  sugar  —  goes 
nearly  all  of  it  into  the  treasury,  hardly  more  than 
$12,000,000  being  raised  here,  and  the  amount  of 
the  indirect  tax  going  to  the  sugar-grower,  both 
taxes  being  paid  by  the  consumer,  is  small.  To 
make  sugar  free  would  greatly  reduce  the  revenue; 
so  much  as  perhaps  to  make  it  necessary  to  keep  on 
the  taxes  on  iron,  coal,  and  wool,  and  for  that  reason 
I  am  inclined  to  think  that  the  Republican  leaders 
will  be  found  going  for  free  sugar,  and  then,  what 
with  free  whiskey  and  tobacco,  it  would  be  claimed 
that  it  will  be  impossible  to  lower  the  other  protec- 
tion duties  and  pay  the  running  expenses  of  the 
government.  Either  this,  or  these  leaders  will  try  to 
increase  the  national  expenses  by  monstrous  pension 
bills  to  catch  the  soldiers'  vote,  by  bounties  and 
subsidies,  so  that  it  will  need  all  our  present  taxa- 
tion and  more  to  meet  our  national  expenses.  The 
one  thing  these  leaders  won't  do  is  to  set  to  work 
and  honestly  reduce  the  tariff  taxes.  The  Demo- 
cratic party,  without  taking  any  particular  stand 
about  free  sugar,  simply  said  in  the  Mills  Bill, 
Take  the  taxes  off  of  lumber,  salt,  and  wool,  and  if 
the  people  are  pleased  with  the  results  which  follow 
we  will  see  about  sugar. 

"But  let  me  go  back  to  my  history  of  what  has 
happened     from  this    sugar-tariff   craze    in    Europe. 


OR,  OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.         173 

First  of  all,  it  has  disturbed  and  confused  the  busi- 
ness of  the  world  and  legitimate  commerce  between 
nations.  It  has  gone  hard  with  many  of  the  West 
India  islands,  where  there  is  no  bounty,  and  forced 
them  either  to  give  up  sugar-raising  or  to  raise  it  by 
large  corporations  availing  themselves  of  the  help  of 
larger  capital,  the  best  processes,  and  the  best 
machinery.  There  is  danger,  both  there  and  in  Java, 
of  the  people  giving  up  sugar-raising  and  relapsing 
into  barbarism.  I  can  show  this  by  an  illustration. 
Suppose  a  man  should  come  into  Rabham  with  a 
great  stock  of  groceries  and  give  them  away  for 
nothing.  You  will  see  that  he  must  break,  or  the 
other  grocers,  perhaps  both.  Certainly  he  would 
unless  he  had  immense  wealth  behind  him,  and  even 
then  it  would  be  best  for  his  finances  for  him  to  die 
young.  If  a  nation  is  fool  enough  to  give  away 
two-fifths,  say,  of  every  pound  of  sugar  it  exports, 
it  is  going  to  get  hurt,  and  so  is  every  other  nation 
without  a  bounty  and  in  the  long  run  with  a  bounty. 
The  fellow  who  can  hold  out  longest  is  the  one  who 
can  stand  having  sugar  given  him.  But  this  is  not 
business,  it  is  a  reckless  way  of  gambling  where 
the  bank  table  is  dead  sure  to  clean  out  the  man 
who  plays  against  it. 

"How  far  the  states  of  continental  Europe  have 
been  hurt  in  this  insane  dunce  of  sugar  duties,  and 
how  sorry  some  of  them  are  over  their  expensive 
silliness,  appear  from  two  facts, —  (1)  The  steps  in 
the  sugar  disaster  are  these  :  first  comes  a  bounty 


174  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

and  everybody  makes  money ;  the  success  increases 
production  ;  then  there  is  a  sugar  glut  at  home  and 
abroad,  owing  to  increased  competition  ;  then  the 
sugar  men  fail ;  then  the  refineries  are  closed  and 
production  is  vastly  diminished;  then  one  or  two 
poor  sugar  crops  aid  the  sugar  scarcit}-,  and  so  it 
has  actually  turned  out  that  a  sugar  bounty  comes 
to  create  a  sugar  famine.  Then  the  fools  who  learri 
nothing  may  begin  again  and  by  the  same  steps 
reach  the  same  disaster.  It  is  a  much  better  way 
for  the  governments  of  the  world  to  give  sugar  a 
rest.  If  let  alone  by  '  protective  '  tariffs  and  boun- 
ties, it  is  quite  able  to  take  care  of  itself.  (2)  Ten 
European  states  and  Brazil,  in  1887,  sent  delegates 
with  credentials  to  a  sugar  '  conference '  in  London 
to  consider  the  whole  system  of  the  sugar  absurdi- 
ties I  have  mentioned,  and  at  their  first  meeting 
agreed  to  submit  this  new  rule  of  conduct  to  their 
respective  governments  for  acceptance :  '  The  high 
contracting  parties  engage  to  take  such  measures  as 
shall  constitute  an  absolute  and  complete  guarantee 
that  no  open  or  disguised  bounty  shall  be  granted 
on  the  manufacture  or  exportation  of  sugar.'  This 
conference,  owing  to  serious  differences  among  its 
members  as  to  how  this  rule  to  which  they  all  agreed 
should  be  carried  out,  adjourned  to  meet  again  in 
1891,  without  further  results.  By  that  time  perhaps 
the  laws  of  nature  will  have  so  far  conquered  that 
continental  Europe  will  have  learned  a  little  wisdom 
from  the  widespread  disaster  fallen  upon  these  peoples 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         175 

from  a  silly  attempt  of  rulers  to  outreach  and  master 
those  unchangeable  laws  of  trade  which  are  backed 
by  all  the  material  and  economic  facts  of  the  globe. 

"  Now,  men,  if  ever  you  hear  Congress  talking  of 
giving  bounties,  repudiate  the  whole  business  as  a 
hoary-headed  and  convicted  fraud.  Throw  your  vote 
sternly  against  any  man  or  any  party  who  advocates 
the  expensive  nonsense. 

"Now,  then,  I  am  going  to  speak  of  ships  and 
then  of  American  ships.  Continental  Europe  has 
also  been  giving  bounties  to  its  shipbuilders,  in 
order  to  increase  their  foreign  commerce.  Now 
ships  are  not  the  parents  of  commerce,  but  its  chil- 
dren, and  the  law  is  :  no  commerce,  no  ships.  Ships 
are  the  wagons  of  the  sea,  and  of  what  use  is  a 
wagon  if  there  be  no  load  to  carry?  Will  a  mail 
raise  any  corn  if  he  buys  a  hundred  ploughs  and  can- 
not own  or  hire  a  single  acre  ?  France  and  other 
nations  only  half  civilized  in  trade  thought  it  a  good 
thing  to  buy  plenty  of  wagons,  plenty  of  ploughs,  to 
begin  with.  France,  at  least,  thinks  so  no  longer. 
For  in  1881  she  offered  a  bounty  of  $12  a  ton  on 
iron  and  steel  ships  built  in  French  dockyards  and  a 
subsidy  of  $3  per  10  tons  for  every  1,000  miles  sailed 
by  French  vessels,  and  also  allowed  her  citizens  to 
buy  foreign  vessels  and  enter  them  under  the  French 
flag.  The  results  have  not  been  altogether  agreea- 
ble to  Frenchmen.  At  first  almost  everybody  built 
ships.  Government  paid  out  much  money  out  of  the 
national  pocket  and  got  its  ships,  the  French  ton- 

1  See  U.  S.  Rep.  on  Com.  and  Nav.,  1887,  p.  89. 


176  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

nage  in  steamers  more  than  doubling  in  two  years 
-300,000  to  700,000.  Frenchmen  had  therefore 
double  the  ships  to  carry  and  fetch  their  goods  —  and 
hardly  any  more  goods  —  no  loads.  Moreover,  six- 
tenths  of  its  new  ships  were  built  in  England,  where 
material  was  untaxed  and  owned  in  large  part  by 
Englishmen,  who  got  the  lion's  share  of  the  French 
bounty.  The  more  ships,  the  more  ships  to  compete 
for  the  French  carrying  trade.  Consequence  —  the 
French  shipping  companies,  who  before  the  bounty 
were  able  to  declare  a  dividend,  ceased  to  do  so; 
many  went  out  of  business  ;  fortunes  made  in  ship- 
ping melted  away;  and  the  French  mercantile 
marine  ceased  to  grow.  If  you  should  talk  to-day 
to  a  French  ship-owner  of  this  bounty  business  he 
might  smile  the  sickly  smile  of  a  sad  memory,  but 
he  would  hardly  assure  you  that  'beautiful  France' 
—  at  least  his  stake  in  it  as  a  ship-owner  —  had  been 
greatly  blessed  by  her  recent  bounties  on  ships.  It 
has  been  just  the  same  failure  with  all  other  nations 
who  have  tried  on  the  same  business. 

"Now  I  wish  to  say  something  about  the  shipping 
of  the  United  States.  The  tonnage  of  vessels  en- 
gaged in  the  coasting  trade  is  very  large,  for  no  for- 
eign ship  is  allowed  to  carry  freights  from  one  of 
our  ports  to  another,  The  tonnage  of  American 
ships  engaged  in  foreign  trade  is  very  small  where 
once  it  was  very  large.  What's  the  matter?  Let 
us  look  at  the  figures.  The  tonnage  of  England  in 
1840  was  6|  millions;  in  1880,  after  about  forty 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         177 

years  of  free  trade,  41^  millions  —  a  more  than  six- 
fold increase.  In  1858  the  total  foreign  tonnage 
cleared  from  American  ports  was  l£  millions  ;  total 
American  tonnage,  3,000,000,  plus.  In  1887  total 
foreign  tonnage  10T7Q  millions ;  American  tonnage 
2-ffi  millions.  In  other  words,  in  1858  foreigners  had 
one-fourth  of  our  carrying  trade ;  we  had  three- 
fourths.  1887 :  foreigners,  five-sixths ;  we,  one-sixth.1 
Or  see  how  Mr.  Gladstone  states  the  situation  in  his 
Leeds  speech,  1881  :  *  In  1850  the  relative  part  that 
England  and  America  had  in  the  sea  trade  of  the 
whole  world  might  be  represented  by  41  to  15.  In 
1880  the  41  of  England  had  grown  to  49,  and  the 
15  of  America  had  dwindled  down  to  6.'  Mr. 
Gladstone  said  on  this  occasion  what  every  man 
who  honors  the  flag  and  its  ancient  glory  upon  the 
seas  should  think  over  carefully.  4  Gentlemen,  my 
youth  was  spent  at  the  mouth  of  the  Mersey,  and  in 
those  days  I  used  to  see  those  beautiful  American 
liners,  the  packets  between  New  York  and  Liverpool 
which  then  controlled  the  bulk  and  the  pick  of  the 
trade  between  the  two  countries.  The  Americans 
were  deemed  to  be  so  utterly  superior  to  us  in  ship- 
building and  navigation  that  they  had  four-fifths 
of  the  whole  trade  of  the  two  countries  in  their  own 
hands  and  that  four-fifths  was  the  best  of  the  trade  ; 
and  but  the  dregs  were  left  in  comparison  to  the 
one-fifth,  the  British  shipping  that  entered  into  it. 
What  is  the  case  now,  when  free  trade  has  operated 
and  has  applied  its  stimulus  to  the  intelligence  of 

1  See  U.S.  Rep.  on  Commerce  and  Nov.,  1887,  p.  89. 


178  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

England,  and  when,  on  the  other  hand,  the  activity  of 
the  Americans  has  been  restrained  by  the  enactment, 
the  enhancement,  and  the  tightening  of  the  protec- 
tive system  ?  The  case  is  now  that  the  scales  are 
exactly  reversed,  and  instead  of  America  doing  four- 
fifths  and  that  the  best,  we  do  four-fifths  of  the  busi- 
ness and  that  the  best ;  and  the  Americans  pick  up, 
if  I  may  so  say,  the  leavings  of  the  British  and  transact 
the  residue  of  the  trade.  Not  because  they  are  infe- 
rior to  us  in  anything ;  they  are  your  descendants ; 
they  are  your  kinsmen ;  and  they  are  fully  equal  to 
you  in  all  that  goes  to  make  human  energy  and 
power,  but  they  are  laboring  under  the  delusion  from 
which  you  yourselves  have  but  recently  escaped.' 

"  To  the  question,  What's  the  matter  with  Ameri- 
can shipping  ?  the  protectionist  has  his  mouth  full  of 
answers,  such  as  they  are.  He  says  our  foreign  ships 
were  destroyed  in  war  times  by  the  Alabama  Con- 
federate war-ship,  and  England  got  the  start  of  us. 
I  answer,  certainly  some  of  our  ships  were  so  de- 
stroyed —  perhaps  as  many  as  were  shipwrecked  in 
any  year  or  two  years  of  peace ;  and  as  they  were 
wooden  ships,  they  would  have  all  gone  out  and 
rotted  long  before  this  with  the  usual  old  age  of 
ships,  and  the  Alabama  can  hardly  be  the  cause 
of  the  decline  of  our  mercantile  shipping,  which 
so  far  as  she  sunk  it  was  sold  at  great  profit  to 
England  herself  in  the  Geneva  award.  Or  he  says 
our  ships  have  gone  because  the  world  is  now 
building  ships  of  iron  and  steel,  and  wooden  ships 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         179 

are  out  of  date.  I  answer,  It  is  true  that  the  days 
of  wooden  ships,  of  sail  ships,  and  of  small  ships  have 
gone  forever,  but  that  in  these  changes  in  naval  archi- 
tecture, the  English  have  suffered  as  well  as  we,  while 
they  have  a  great  mercantile  fleet  and  ours  is  chiefly 
noticeable  for  its  absence.  Or  he  says  we  cannot 
compete  with  English  ships  because  it  costs  more  to 
sail  an  American  ship  than  an  English  one.  And  if 
I  ask  him  why  that  is,  he  trots  out  that  antiquated 
and  exploded  spook  of  '  pauper  labor '  as  the  reason. 
But  I  have  already  proved  to  you  that  American 
labor  is  cheaper  than  English  labor,  because  the 
American  mechanic  hands  back  in  his  labor  to  his 
employer  at  least  twice  as  much  as  his  English 
brother  does,  and  that  so  far  our  shipbuilder  has 
a  large  advantage  over  his  British  competitor.  Or 
he  says  that  the  wages  of  American  sailors  are 
higher ;  that  they  are  better  fed,  and  therefore  cost 
more  than  seamen  in  English  ships.  I  answer  that 
the  difference  of  our  seamen's  wages  when  compared 
with  English  wages  on  shipboard  is  about  the  same 
as  the  difference  of  other  wages  in  the  two  nations, 
as  I  have  before  explained  to  you  —  that  undoubtedly 
it  costs  less  to  feed  an  English  sailor  because  his 
food  is  at  free-trade  prices  and  so  one-third  cheaper 
than  our  tax-ridden  laborers  and  sailors  pay;  but 
that  English  sailors  have  poorer  food  or  less  than 
enough,  it  would  be  very  difficult  for  him  or  any 
other  man  to  prove.  Now  let  me  whisper  in  the 
protectionist's  ear  my  first  answer  to  the  question, 


180  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

What's  the  matter  with  the  American  foreign  ship- 
ping ?  If  he  won't  hear  me,  he  will  hear  in  a  very 
near  future  the  rustle  of  the  wise  ballots  of  Ameri- 
can citizens,  and  behind  these  ballots  the  thunder  of 
tired  millions  crying  out,  ;  This  protection  business 
lias  sunk  American  shipping  in  the  sea  of  its  own 
greed,  and  we  who  are  yet  out  of  our  graves  will 
have  some  other  undertaker  than  you.  Get  out  and 
down,  and  we  will  show  you  how  a  great  nation  like 
ours  can  build  all  the  ships  we  need  or  want.'  I 
agree  with  that  verdict.  I  say  to  protection,  We 
both  agree  that  great  ships,  iron  or  steel  ships,  steam- 
ships, must  hereafter  carry  the  foreign  freight  of  the 
world's  commerce.  Iron,  steel,  and  coal  are  all 
taxed  in  the  United  States.  Compute  for  me  the 
tax  on  the  steel  which  would  go  into  a  steel  ship 
of  4,000  tons.  Compute  for  me  the  tax  on  the  coal 
that  ship  must  carry  in  its  bunkers;  compute 
taxes  that  swarm  all  over  such  a  ship  from  keel  to 
smoke-stack,  and  then  tell  me  whether  a  ship  so  taxed 
is  not  already  sunk  on  the  very  stocks;  doomed  to 
defeat  in  competing  with  the  free,  untaxed  ships  of 
England  in  what  must  always  be  a  close  race  in 
earning  upon  the  high  seas  a  part  of  the  bread  on 
which  every  masterful  race  must  feed  itself  to  eco- 
nomic greatness.  That's  what's  the  matter. 

"There  is,  in  my  judgment,  a  still  stronger  reason 
why,  as  things  now  stand,  the  United  States  could 
never,  by  any  accident  or  emergency,  become  a  great 
maritime  power.  I  have  called  ships  the  wagons  of 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.         181 

the  sea.  Under  the  American  tariff  these  wagons 
have  no  loads,  —  no  exports,  —  and  therefore  only 
one-half  their  natural  freights  ;  and  the  imports  are 
therefore  in  foreign  ships.  Why  not?  It  does  not 
pay  for  a  ship  to  go  out  in  ballast  for  a  home  cargo, 
and  the  ship  which  can  carry  freight  both  ways  is  the 
only  ship  which  usually  declares  a  dividend.  Look  at 
the  way  this  protection  sinks  commerce  under  seas  in 
the  South-American  trade,  for  instance.  Suppose  an 
American  merchant  or  a  dozen  of  them  want  to  send 
shoes  to  Brazil  because,  on  account  of  free  hides,  shoes 
have  a  better  show  to  be  sold  at  a  profit  in  the  for- 
eign markets.  These  merchants  look  round  for  an 
American  ship.  They  may  possibly  find  one  laid  up 
in  an  out-of-the-way  dock,  where  the  dockage  is 
cheap.  The  owner  says,  '  I  should  like  to  carry  out 
your  shoes,  but  where  is  the  rest  of  my  freight  com- 
ing from? '  And  then  it  is  generally  found  that  the 
shoes  cannot  be  sent  in  an  American  bottom,  because 
most  other  American  goods  cannot  get  out,  being 
buried  at  home  under  high-cost  tariff  taxes ;  and  so 
the  shoes  —  neither  ship-owner  nor  merchant  being 
able  to  make  up  a  mixed  cargo  —  go  out,  if  at  all,  in 
a  foreign,  usually  an  English,  vessel.  That  is  the 
way  protection  '  protects  '  American  ships. 

"  Take  another  instance,  which,  like  the  last,  fur- 
nishes the  true  answer  to  the  question,  What's  the 
matter  with  our  American  shipping?  Some  years 
ago  the  government  of  Chili  was  about  to  buy  a 
large  number  of  locomotives  for  its  railroads.  As 


182  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

the  South  American  republics,  so  far  as  our  bar- 
baric high  tariff  allows,  prefer  to  deal  with  their  fel- 
low republicans  of  the  United  States,  Chili  gave 
certain  of  our  locomotive-builders  a  chance  to  fur- 
nish the  locomotives.  The  proposed  terms  were 
satisfactory  to  all  parties;  but  Chili  said,  '  You  must 
take  your  pay  in  copper.'  The  answer  was,  'Chili 
copper  cannot  come  in  at  a  profit,  because  Lake 
Superior  copper  has  a  high  tariff  tax  against  your 
copper.'  The  upshot  was  that  England  got  the  con- 
tract, carried  home  the  copper  for  pay  in  English 
ships;  made,  doubtless,  English  small  wares  out  of 
some  of  it,  and  managed  to  sell  them  in  the  United 
States ;  got  in  short,  a  fine  bargain,  and  our  manu- 
facturers got  —  '  protection.'  But  what  did  Ameri- 
can ships  get?  Leave  of  absence  to  rot  at  a  wharf, 
perhaps. 

"  Another  incident  connected  with  perhaps  our 
wool  and  leather  industries,  and  told  me  by  a  large 
manufacturer  of  American  leather,  may  serve  to 
maintain  my  plea  for  American  ships  against  the 
c  protection  '  wreckers.  South  American  sheepskins 
are  exported  with  the  wool  on.  But  there  is  a  high 
tariff  on  wool  in  order  to  make  blankets  and  coats 
dearer  for  the  '  dear  people,'  so  deeply  loved  by  the 
protectionists.  These  skins  are,  therefore,  exported 
to  England,  where  the  wool  is  taken  off  and  sold  to 
the  English  woollen  manufacturers,  in  an  industry 
that  gives  employment  to  a  large  number  of  men 
and  women  there,  then  these  skins  are  reshipped 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         183 

here  and  sold  to  our  manufacturer,  who  tans  and 
finishes  them  into  sheepskins.  These  skins  are  then 
sold  and  made  into  shoes,  and  the  man  who  buys 
these  shoes  pays  his  part,  in  the  comedy  of  commerce, 
of  the  expense  of  this  roundabout,  expensive,  and 
useless  trade.  But  where  does  the  American  ship 
come  in,  and  the  American  mechanic?  We  may  have 
the  wagon  laid  up  in  a  dockyard,  but  the  other  fellow 
has  carried  the  load  and  got  his  pay.  What  we  want 
here  in  the  United  States  is  not  only  more  wagons, 
but  more  loads.  Show  us  Americans  the  loads,  or 
even  convince  us  that  they  are  behind  the  hills  but 
coming  soon,  and  we  will  find  you  all  the  ships  you 
need.  To  build  up  American  foreign  shipping,  you 
have  only  to  build  up  American  trade.  And  there 
is  no  other  way  to  build  up  American  foreign  trade 
than  by  tearing  down  this  whole  protection  shanty 
of  barbarism,  which  keeps  in  everything  it  can,  and 
lets  out  only  what  it  cannot  stop.  Free  trade,  as  I 
have  explained  the  term,  is  as  necessary  and  as  safe 
to  American  shipping  as  a  free  compass  by  which  the 
shipmaster  lays  his  course. 

"  Perhaps  an  article  in  the  leading  newspaper  of 
Chili,  on  the  report  of  the  United  States  Commission 
sent  out  in  1884  to  study  our  trade  with  the  South 
American  republics,  may  show  us  how  our  tariff  and 
its  animosity  are  regarded  by  our  neighbors  in  South 
America.  '  Although  the  document,'  it  says, '  reflects 
the  timidity  of  those  who  care  not  to  wrestle  boldly 
with  deep-rooted  prejudices  and  vested  interests,  it 


184  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

at  leasts  raises  a  corner  of  the  curtain  that  has 
hitherto  screened  from  the  American  people  the 
contemplation  of  the  disastrous  effects  of  a  legisla- 
tion that  is  no  less  a  stain  on  their  glorious  name, 
that  is  not  less  unjust,  less  mournful,  nor  less  con- 
trary to  the  spirit  of  their  institutions,  than  the 
slavery  that,  for  so  many  years,  tarnished  their  flag 
and  made  them  a  scandal  among  the  nations  of  the 
earth.  What  the  report  proves,  both  at  bottom  and 
between  the  lines,  is  that  the  cause  of  an  economical 
evil  sought  for  here  by  the  United  States  envoys  does 
not  exist  hereabouts,  but  must  be  looked  for  nearer 
the  home  of  those  who,  in  the  hopes  of  its  discovery, 
have  circumnavigated  a  whole  continent ;  and  our 
only  hope  is  that  the  report  may  convince  our  north- 
ern brethren  that  situations  such  as  they  are  endeav- 
oring to  improve  are  not  to  be  remedied  with  words, 
nor  with  more  or  less  pathetic  exhortations  to  amend 
these  ways,  addressed  to  those  who  have  not  sinned, 
nor  with  counsels  that  so  ill  become  those  who  belie 
them  by  their  example,  but  rather  by  a  return  to  the 
practice  of  what  is  taught  us  by  justice,  liberty, 
science,  and  reciprocity. 

"6In  order  to  place  themselves  in  a  position  to 
dispute  with  England  for  the  markets  of  Central 
and  South  America,  the  United  States  have  only  to 
adopt  a  tariff  as  simple  and  liberal  as  that  of  Great 
Britain."' 

.  Mr.  Freeman  made  a  stop  here  and  looked  at  his 
watch.  "It  is  past  ten  o'clock,  men,"  he  said,  "but 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         185 

I  want  to  say  one  tiling  more  before  we  go  out.  I 
have  looked,  too  much  perhaps,  in  all  these  talks,  on 
the  'bread  and  butter'  side  of  the  American  tariff, 
and  to-night  has  been  very  much  like  the  rest.  I 
wish  to  say  now,  that  if  I  have  a  heart,  there  is  a 
soft  spot  in  it  somewhere,  towards  all  ships  of  what- 
ever nation,  coining  in  or  out  in  peaceful  commerce, 
and  especially  towards  all  ships  under  the  '  Stars  and 
Stripes.'  I  have  lived  all  my  life  close  here  by  the 
sea,  and  I  never  see  a  coaster  coming  in  here  to  bring 
iron  and  coal  to  the  foundry  but  what  I  take  a  longer 
breath,  and  somehow  seem  to  be  a  larger  and  en- 
hanced man  as  I  am  looking  at  her  white  sails  and 
the  gliding  motion  of  her  graceful  course.  I  shall 
never  forget  my  emotion  when,  years  ago,  in  a  for- 
eign land,  having  come  down  from  seeing  Milan 
Cathedral,  in  whose  square  were  set  Austrian  cannon 
with  Austrian  sentinels  to  keep  down  Italy  under 
the  double-headed  Austrian  eagle,  I  saw  in  the  har- 
bor of  Genoa  a  ship  with  the  American  flag  at  her 
masthead.  It  was  a  symbol,  proud,  rich  in  the  mem- 
ories of  heroes,  and  stood  for  the  equality  and  liberty 
which  affirms  itself  in  the  constitution  of  our  great 
republic,  which  gives  us  all  a  home  and  a  grave,  over 
both  of  which  may  that  flag  float  and  protect.  I  do 
not  say  it  as  a  business  man,  I  say  it  as  an  American  ; 
as  a  human  being,  if  you  like.  I  want  that  flag  to 
fly  again  at  the  peak  often  thousand  stately  ships  sail- 
ing all  ways  in  peaceful  commerce  to  carry  and  bring 
plenty  and  comfort  to  the  human  race.  I  would 


186  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

like,  in  winter  nights,  with  the  driving  wind  north- 
east, and  the  moan  of  the  surf  on  shore,  to  think  of 
our  gallant  ships  in  the  storm  at  sea,  plunging  on  to 
port,  red  fires  below  in  the  furnaces,  and  the  engineer 
watching  the  steam-gauge,  hand  on  engine-lever,  all 
taut  and  firm  as  steel  and  the  hammers  of  American 
mechanics  could  frame ;  on  deck,  two  men  at  the 
wheel,  captain  on  quarter-deck,  trumpet  in  hand,  an 
American  crew  standing  ready  of  eye  and  hand ;  while 
the  ship  herself,  steady,  but  quivering  under  blows  of 
the  sea  waves  hurled  against  her  by  the  hands  of 
Titans  from  the  under  waters,  carries  her  stanch, 
true  course  toward  home.  I  would  like  to  think, 
I  say,  and  know,  that  our  American  blood  in  these 
days  of  trade  is  no  less  red  or  masterful  than  in 
the  days  of  old ;  and  that  American  ships  nowadays 
in  their  struggle  of  the  sea  show  equal  with  the  best, 
masters  of  most,  in  the  heroism  which  has  always 
followed  hard  upon  the  men  of  stalwart  peoples  who 
go  down  to  the  sea  in  ships. 

"  I  love  ships,  and  am  not  ashamed  of  it.     Good- 
night." 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         187 


CHAPTER   XL 

"  TO-NIGHT  brings  us,"  Mr.  Freeman  said  at  the 
next  meeting,  "  to  farmers  and  railroads.  Nearly 
one-half  of  our  laboring  people  are  farmers  —  by  the 
census  of  1880,  7,700,000,  plus,  out  of  17,400,000. 
No  class,  therefore,  ought  to  be  more  interested  in 
the  tariff  question  than  the  men  who  till  the  soil. 
Farmers,  or  I  should  say  the  Eastern  and  Middle 
States  farmers,  are  a  conservative  class  and  slow  to 
move  or  change  opinions.  The  Western  farmer  is  a 
more  lively  sort  of  a  fellow  and  will  go  any  way 
where  his  interest  lies,  when  he  has  made  up  his 
mind  for  a  change.  The  slow  mental  movement  of 
the  farmers  declining  to  examine  the  tariff  question 
for  themselves  went  far  to  defeat  the  Democratic 
party  in  the  election  just  had.  The  American  farm- 
er can  be  relied  on  to  finally  decide  right,  and  I 
should  be  very  much  surprised  if,  in  the  next 
national  election,  he  is  not  found  on  the  side  of 
tariff  reform  and  in  the  ranks  of  the  only  party  that 
means  honest  reform.  I  have  already  told  you  that 
the  farmer  cannot  be  protected  in  what  he  sells, 
because  the  price  of  his  grain  is  fixed  at  home  by 
the  free-trade  market  of  Liverpool.  The  protection- 
ist, however,  tells  him  that  protection  gives  him  the 


188  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

home  market.  He  says  to  him,  How  can  you  sell 
your  small  fruits,  berries,  apples,  pears,  etc.,  unless 
the  villages  and  towns  buy  them?  You  see  that 
begs  the  whole  question  between  protection  and  free 
trade,  for  it  assumes  that  if  there  were  no  protective 
tariff  there  would  be  either  no  villages  and  towns  to 
buy^  or  fewer,  whereas  the  tariff-reformer  holds  and 
undertakes  to  prove  that  a  reformed  tariff,  quicken- 
ing trade,  would  give  the  farmer  more  customers 
more  able  to  buy.  I  wish  to  say  just  here  these  two 
tilings  :  First,  the  farmer  is  Ids  own  best  customer, 
inasmuch  as  he  and  his  family  undoubtedly  consume 
nigh  one-half  of  all  his  wheat  taken  by  the  home 
market,  and  other  things  he  raises,  in  like  proportion. 
Second,  that  under  no  circumstances  could  most  of 
his  perishable  crops,  like  the  finer  vegetables  and 
fruits,  have  any  foreign  competition,  distance  in 
most  cases  creating  a  natural  and  prohibitory  tariff 
in  his  favor.  If  any  one  alleges  that  Canada  might 
compete,  one  part  of  the  answer  is  that  Canada, 
being  further  north,  must  compete  under  a  great  dis- 
advantage, and  that  in  any  case  the  American  farmer 
who  successfully  competes  in  his  wheat  with  tlie 
Indian  ryots,  paid  12  cents  a  day,  can  undoubtedly 
outmatch  his  Canadian  neighbor,  vastly  better  paid, 
in  any  market  where  they  two  might  come  in  con- 
tact. In  meats,  for  instance,  I  suppose  we  could 
always  sell  largely  to  Canada.  But,  without  press- 
ing that  point  further,  I  will  throw  out  a  hint  as  to 
a  whole  set  of  blessings  which  would  come  to  the 


OR,  OUR  'TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.      189 

farmer  under  free  trade.  If  tlie  tax  was  taken  off 
sugar,  in  ten  years'  time  he  would  reap  a  larger  profit 
from  his  preserved  fruits  sold  over  the  world  than  he 
does  now  from  all  his  c  truck  '  business  in  the  home 
market,  grains  only  excepted.  And  I  hold  that  new 
industries  springing  up  under  a  free-trade  tariff,  as 
was  the  case  in  England,  is  one  of  the  chief  ways  in 
which  the  farmer  can  expect  to  better  his  condition. 
Certainly,  his  present  condition  does  not  please  him, 
nor  is  it  a  condition  to  please  any  philanthropic 
man.  If  you  want  proof  of  the  unsatisfactory  con- 
dition of  the  farmer,  ask  some  statistician  how  many 
hundred  millions  of  dollars  lie  in  mortgages  on 
Western  farms  and  what  rates  of  interest  they  call 
for,  and  how  much  has  been  paid  back  of  the  money 
lent.  I  suppose  that  this  dissatisfaction  must  pre- 
vail among  the  cotton  farmers  of  the  South.  We 
do  not  hear  much  from  them,  but  I  suppose  they  are 
faring  very  much  like  the  rest.  I  know  that  they 
cannot  escape  tariff  taxes  any  more  than  they  can 
jump  away  from  their  own  shadows  in  their  Southern 
sun.  I  know  it  is  so  in  the  East,  and  from  personal 
observation  as  well  as  from  the  reports  of  late  trav- 
ellers I  am  sure  that  this  dissatisfaction  is  both  wide- 
spread and  very  bitter  in  the  West.  Indeed  signs 
are  not  wanting  that,  unless  relief  is  soon  had,  there 
is  going  to  be  such  a  passionate  outbreak  among  the 
farmers  of  the  West  as  has  been  never  witnessed; 
for  the  American  farmer  is  no  serf  or  peasant,  but 
generally  an  intelligent,  hard-working  American 


190  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

citizen,  slow  to  wrath,  but,  when  roused  by  a  wrong, 
dangerous  to  meddle  with  or  to  deny.  I  say  this 
American  farmer  is  going  to  demand  an  honest  re- 
form of  the  tariff,  and  he  is  going  to  get  it.  Why 
not?  He  cannot  gain  anything,  either  in  his  home  or 
foreign  market,  on  what  he  sells  out  of  this  tariff. 
What  does  this  tariff  get  out  of  him?  Speaking 
roundly,  about  one-third  of  his  whole  income. 
How?  you  ask.  By  taking  a  tax  of  about  40  per 
cent  on  everything  he  builds,  buys,  or  uses.  If 
there  is  one  place  in  this  land  where  tariff  taxes  love 
to  swarm,  to  dance,  to  breed  discomfort  and  penury; 
to  chill  comfort  and  to  drive  out  plenty,  it  is  the 
American  farm.  These  taxes  smuggle  themselves 
into  the  farmer's  machinery,  inhabit  his  barns,  de- 
spoil his  table,  narrow  his  rooms,  and  flaunt  their 
meanness  in  the  dresses  of  his  wife  and  daughters, 
and  inscribe  themselves  in  every  bill  of  goods  which 
he  buys  for  home  comfort. 

"Now,  look  around  the  farm  and  into  the  farmer's 
house.  A  careful  estimate  has  been  made  of  the 
cost  of  a  farmer's  outfit  and  the  support  of  his  fam- 
ily of  six  persons,  husband  and  wife,  two  bo}^s  and 
two  girls,  for  a  single  year.  The  whole  sum  is  set 
down  as  about  $500,  certainly  a  modest  estimate. 
Of  this  amount,  under  our  tariff,  $180  would  vanish 
in  a  taxation  invisible  to  the  victims.  The  Mills 
Bill  would  have  made  this  taxation  $84  less,  and 
free  trade,  at  the  very  least,  thirty  per  cent  less,  or 
about  $160  less ;  $341  instead  of  the  original  $500. 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         191 

I  do  not  understand  that  anything  raised  on  the 
farm,  either  grain,  meat,  or  vegetables,  is  included 
in  this  estimate.  If  any  farmer  asks  you  to  tell  him 
what  the  matter  is  that  he  can't  get  on,  answer  him, 
4  Tariff  fcixes.' 

"  It  is  perfectly  true  that  he  gets  a  certain  nomi- 
nal 'protection'  for  his  products  under  the  tariff, 
for  instance,  one  cent  a  pound  on  beef  and  pork  ;  ham 
and  bacon  and  lard,  2  cents  ;  batter  and  cheese,  4 
cents  ;  20  cents  on  wheat,  and  15  cents  on  rye  ;  oats 
and  corn,  10  cents ;  live  animals,  20  per  cent  ad  val- 
orem ;  but  it  is  also  true  that  if  all  these  articles 
were  on  the  free  list,  except  wheat,  none  of  them 
could  come  in  against  our  farmers,  and  that  in  the 
case  of  wheat  from  Canada  it  could  not  make  a  dif- 
ference of  more  than  one-tenth  of  one  per  cent  a 
bushel,  and  this  would  be  offset  by  the  labor  in 
transportation,  paid  to  our  own  people ;  and  that 
other  necessaries  of  life  would  come  cheaper  to  our 
farmer,  notably  the  timber  to  build  his  house  and 
barns.  And  just  here  let  me  call  two  witnesses  to 
show  how  the  tariff  on  lumber  affects  the  great 
masses  of  our  people,  including  the  farmers,  when 
they  come  to  build  houses.  The  first  witness  is 
Mr.  O.  R.  Bishop  of  Chicago,  an  iron-worker,  repre- 
senting the  Knights  of  Labor  before  the  Tariff  Corn- 
mission,  who  said,  '  The  lumber  lords  say  that  they 
pay  117,000,000  to  56,000  men,  which  divided  would 
give  each  man  $304  a  year  to  support  himself  and 
family.'  (Many  of  these  men  were  imported  from 


192  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

Canada  to  keep  up  wages,  as  these  ;  protection '  gen- 
tlemen are  so  fond  of  telling  us  ;  and  men  are  now 
working  in  the  lumber  regions  for  less  than  one  dol- 
lar a  day.)  '  But  the  few  employers  tell  us  that 
they  cleared  nearly  $4,000,000,  net,  and  still  have 
$40,000,000  worth  of  mills  and  tools  on  hand.  The 
other  day,  these  same  gentlemen  met  and  raised  the 
price  of  lumber  $1.50  a  thousand,  all  round,  which 
is  likely  to  increase  their  profit  to  $8,000,000,  a  very 
mild  species  of  robbery ; '  and  the  consumer  cer- 
tainly is  not  the  robber.  Put  lumber  on  the  free  list, 
and  you  save  the  people  $16,000,000  yearly,  and  the 
wages  of  the  lumber-workers  would  not  fall  one  cent. 
"  The  next  witness  is  Mr.  Blanchard  of  Chicago, 
referred  to  by  Congressman  Hooker  of  Mississippi, 
in  the  tariff  debate  of  May  9,  1888.  I  have  no 
knowledge  of  Mr.  Blanchard,  but  I  like  his  refresh- 
ing frankness,  if  not  his  tariff  filching.  He  says, 
'  I  am  high  tariff  on  lumber,  but  low  tariff  on  copper, 
iron,  wool,  cotton,  leather,  glass,  etc.  I  will  tell  you 
why.  I  own  timber  lands  and  stumpage '  (trees  on 
the  stump)  ;  '  besides,  I  operate  largely  myself,  and 
this  tariff  puts  money  in  my  pocket.  I  get  $2  per 
thousand  for  my  boards  and  stumpage.  I  have  just 
sold  5,000,000  feet  of  lumber.  The  tariff  gives  me 
just  $10,000  profit  on  that  trade.1  That  is  the  differ- 
ence to  me  between  high  tariff  and  free  lumber.  I* 
am  high  tariff  on  lumber,  I  am.  The  blessed  tariff, 
they  tell  us,  is  all  for  the  benefit  of  the  American 
laborer.  What  do  you  suppose  I  did  with  the 
1  See  note,  p.  000. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         193 

3,000  ?  Divide  it  among  my  workmen  ?  Not  a 
bit  of  it.  I  put  it  right  into  this  calfskin  pocket,  I 
did.  Of  all  my  workmen,  I  am  the  only  protected 
American  laborer.  Wages  depend  upon  supply  and 
demand,  and  not  upon  taxes.'  l 

"  I  suppose  that  man,  at  least,  was  born  honest. 
The  American  farmer,  therefore,  who  upholds  the 
tariff  for  the  profit  in  it  to  him,  is  very  like  the  man 
suggested  by  Henry  George,  who,  buying  a  share  of 
stock  in  a  railroad,  bought  a  ticket  and  rode  over 
that  road  every  day  in  order  to  increase  his  dividend  ! 
Look  at  his  house.  I  hear  that  in  Kansas  the  farmer 
often  lives  in  a  hole  in  the  ground,  as  our  fore- 
fathers might  have  done  in  Britain  two  thousand  years 
ago.  It  is  a  mercy  that  this  tariff  don't  tax  that 
hole  ;  but  if  he  puts  in  for  finish  a  foot  of  lumber, 
a  shingle,  a  nail,  a  bit  of  wall-paper,  a  smirch  of 
paint,  it  taxes  them,  and  the  rate  is  collected  out  of 
the  hand  of  a  toiler  often  poorly  paid,  under-fed,  and, 
to  say  the  least,  not  too  warmly  clothed.  I  know 
very  well  the  comfort  of  many  farmers'  homes,  for  I 
have  enjoyed  it.  But  in  most  cases  these  are  in  the 
older  States,  and  generally  it  has  taken  at  least  three 
generations  of  frugal  men  to  make  these  homes 
what  they  are.  But  I  am  sure  that  most  farmers' 
homes,  especially  South  and  West,  are  not  such  as 
are  creditable  to  a  land  so  rich  as  ours.  Let  me 
back  up  what  I  say  with  a  few  statistics.  First,  as 
to  the  numbers  of  American  homes  as  compared 
with  our  increasing  population. 

1  Cec  note,  p.  267. 


194  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

"  In  1850  there  were  3,598,240  families,  who  had 
3,362,337  homes,  that  is,  235,903  families  without 
homes.  In  1860  there  were  5,210,934  families  and 
4,969,692  homes,  that  is,  there  were  241,242  families 
without  separate  homes.  The  families  had  increased 
1,612,694  in  number,  and  all  of  these  had  new  homes 
but  5,339.  But  from  1850  to  1860  there  was  the 
lowest  tariff  the  United  States  ever  had.  Now  look 
at  the  statistics  from  1860  to  1870  under  the  highest 
tariff  we  ever  had.  In  1870,  there  were  7,579,363 
families  living  in  7,042,833  dwellings.  In  other 
words,  the  number  of  homeless  families  had  risen 
to  536,510.  In  ten  years,  families  without  separate 
homes  had  increased  123  per  cent.  There  were  now 
295,268  such  families.  Or  take  the  statistics  of  1870- 
80,  ten  more  years  of  a  high  tariff.  Such  families  had 
then  increased  to  990,108,  an  increase  of  almost  a 
hundred  per  cent  as  against  three  per  cent  for  the 
low-tariff  period  of  1850-60.  It  was  during  this 
period  that  the  "  tramp "  was  evolved ;  and  five 
hundred  thousand  homeless  men  began  wandering 
idly  over  the  country.  Now  put  a  single  fact  as  a 
sharp  contrast  to  these  figures.  In  the  same  period, 
according  to  their  own  returns,  the  manufacturers 
of  the  United  States  got  an  increase  of  capital  of 
$674,063,837. 

"  Nor  is  this  all  the  injury  that  this  tariff  works 
upon  the  American  farmer.  We  are  gradually  shut- 
ting him  out  from  his  foreign  markets,  which  he 
must  have  in  order  to  live,  by  irritating  his  Euro- 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         195 

pean  customers  with  tariff  duties  against  what  they 
would  like  to  sell  us.  We  keep  out  French  silks  and 
wines;  France,  therefore,  turns  round  and  forbids 
American  pork  to  come  in.  We  tax  Belgium  112 
per  cent  on  her  plate  glass ;  so  she  forbids  the  import 
of  American  beef  and  pork.  The  fact  is,  that  with 
our  immense  and  rich  territory  we  shall  always  be 
dangerous  to  the  small  and  overpopulated  states  of 
Europe,  like  France  and  Germany,  in  all  agricul- 
tural products.  If  we  are  not  careful,  if  we  continue 
to  irritate  with  a  hostile  tariff  these  nations,  it  is 
likely  to  happen,  and  at  no  distant  date,  that  they 
will  form,  so  to  speak,  the  United  States  of  Europe 
and  agree  to  keep  out  the  agricultural  products  of 
the  United  States  of  America.  There  is  a  growing 
feeling  of  this  sort  in  France,  and  the  plan  is  now 
publicly  discussed  by  the  professors  of  political 
economy  on  the  Continent.  That  is  to  say,  the 
American  farmer  is  not  only  cursed  by  the  tariff 
taxes  at  home,  but  he  is  threatened,  in  the  supposed 
interests  of  the  manufacturer,  with  the  destruction 
of  his  markets  abroad,  and  that  would  destroy  his 
home  market  by  forcing  down  prices  here  by  his 
farm  surplus.  The  United  States  must  either  sell 
their  farm  surplus,  or  face  a  crisis.  So  the  protec- 
tion humbug  shears  its  silly  sheep  down  under  their 
very  skins. 

"In  the  next  place  I  will  show  you  how  this 
tariff  further  robs  the  farmer  through  the  railroads  ; 
not  how  the  railroads  rob  him.  I  know  that  these 


196  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

roads  may  be  unjust  and  cruel  sometimes  towards 
the  public,  for  they  are  trying  to  make  a  dividend, 
like  every  other  business;  but  I  hold  that  railroads 
are  the  victims,  not  the  agents  of  this  tariff  steal,  and 
for  this  reason.  They  carry  freight.  In  a  free  ex- 
change of  goods  their  freights  would  increase  to  fur- 
nish better  dividends.  A  single  fact  will  show  the 
situation.  In  the  year  1887,  the  manufacturers  of 
steel  rails  realized  from  the  tariff  more  than 
$11,000,000  above  an  honest  profit,  and  therefore 
steel  rails  sold  to  the  railroads  cost  this  amount  more. 
The  roads  paid  this  sum,  and  will  take  it,  must  take 
it,  out  of  their  customers,  notably  the  farmers,  in  the 
shape  of  higher  rates  on  everything  they  carry. 
There  may  be  certain  exceptions,  for  reasons,  but  in 
general  this  rule  prevails,  and  it  prevails  in  every 
taxed  thing  which  goes  into  the  construction  of  a 
railroad. 

"  Now  I  wish  to  speak  a  good  word  for  railroads 
as  the  farmers'  friend.  I  know  some  farmers  think 
they  are  enemies.  The  English  farmers  were  at  first 
bitterly  hostile  to  the  locomotive  when  invented  by 
George  Stephenson,  and  took  every  opportunity  to 
show  their  dislike.  In  the  same  way  Vermont 
farmers  were  hostile  to  the  railroad  that  came  among 
them,  as  I  have  before  told  you,  on  the  ground  that 
it  would  destroy  the  value  of  horseflesh  by  driving 
horse  teams  out  of  the  freight  business,  as  it  did. 
But  after  forty  years  Vermont  horses  bring  better 
prices  than  ever.  If  any  one  wishes  to  test  the  Ver- 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND   ITS   TAXES.         197 

mont  farmers'  opinion  about  -railroads,  it  is  only  ne- 
cessary to  propose  to  abolish  them  and  see  what  a  rage 
all  classes  would  show  against  the  proposition.  The 
fact  is  that  railroads  and  steamships  have  been 
powerful  agents  in  creating  the  new  civilization  of 
the  world  and  of  the  West.  If  railroads  were 
abolished  in  the  West,  the  Western  farmers,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  rest  of  us,  would  either  die  or  flee 
away  as  from  something  worse  than  cholera  or 
yellow-fever,  and  the  land  would  return  to  a  wilder- 
ness. A  railroad  is  merely  a  gigantic  machine  to 
carry  freights  of  men  or  things,  and  is  a  great  power 
in  maintaining  human  comfort  and  developing  the 
magnificent  and  unsellable  civilization  of  the  future. 
It  is  an  iron  band  to  bind  together  the  peoples  of 
the  continents,  and  steamships  bind  together  conti- 
nents and  the  isles  of  the  sea.  Let  me  show  you 
what  these  two  machines  for  carrying  freight  do,  by 
quoting  a  sentence  from  our  great  American  econo- 
mist, Mr.  D.  A.  Wells.  '  Bessemer  steel  rails,  steam- 
ships, the  Suez  Canal,  have  brought"  the  wheat  fields 
of  Dakota  and  India,  the  grazing  lands  of  Texas, 
Colorado,  Australia,  and  the  Argentine  Republic, 
nearer  to  Manchester  operatives  than  the  farms  of 
Illinois  before  the  war  were  to  the  spindles  and  looms 
of  New  England.'  A  leading  farmer  of  Devonshire 
said  before  the  British  Commission  in  1888,  '  I  have 
calculated  that  the  produce  of  five  acres  of  wheat 
can  be  brought  from  Chicago  to  Liverpool  at  less 
than  the  cost  of  manuring  one  acre  of  wheat  in 


198  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

England.'  Besides,  in  the  old  days,  for  lack  of  trans- 
portation, the  people  of  one  province  would  starve 
to  death,  while  there  was  plenty  almost  everywhere 
else,  as  was  the  case  in  France  as  late  almost  as 
1800  A.D.  Not  more  than  ten  years  ago  more  than 
ten  millions  of  people  died  from  starvation  in .  two 
provinces  of  China,  while  there  was  plenty  else- 
where, simply  because  there  was  no  transportation. 
Thanks  to  railroads  and  steamships,  it  is  now  held 
that  henceforth  there  can  never  be  a  famine  again  in 
Christendom.  Take  these  other  facts.  The  aver- 
age transportation  or  railroad  rates  in  the  United 
States  are  lower  than  in  any  other  country  in  the 
world,  although  other  nations  have  nominally  cheaper 
labor  and  far  denser  populations.  A  full  year's  sup- 
ply of  bread  and  meat  for  an  adult  person  can  now 
be  moved  from  the  bread  centres  a  thousand  miles 
for  a  single  day's  wages  of  an  average  mechanic. 
Fifty  years  ago,  in  the  West,  over  good  roads,  the 
cost  of  carting  a  ton  of  wheat  120  miles,  worth  $25 
at  a  market,  would  equal  the  whole  original  value. 
In  1885  there  were  probably  300,000  miles  of  rail- 
roads. Fairly  assuming,  on  the  well-known  basis  of 
our  own  statistics,  that  the  railroad  system  of  the 
world  in  that  year  could  have  carried  120,000,000,000 
tons  one  mile,  and  it  follows  that  this  system  thus 
gave  to  help  human  labor  a  force  greater  than  that 
of  a  horse  working  twelve  days  yearly,  for  every  in- 
habitant of  the  globe.  Again,  the  railroad  freight 
service  of  the  United  States  for  1887  is  computed  to 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         199 

be  equivalent  to  carrying  a  thousand  tons  one  mile 
for  every  one  of  our  60,000,000  citizens,  at  a  cost  of 
$10  to  each  person.  Now  if  this  same  work  had 
been  done  in  the  old  way,  with  horses,  it  would  have 
cost  f 200  for  each  inhabitant  —  a  cost  greater  than 
all  the  nation  produced  that  year,  more  for  horse 
cartage  than  we  earned.  It  is  for  the  interests  of 
all  honest  farmers  to  see  to  it,  through  their  legisla- 
tures, that  their  railroads  are  kept  open  ;  that  their 
building  expenses  are  not  swollen  by  '  protective ' 
taxes,  and  that  their  stock  is  in  no  way,  under  any 
disguise,  'watered.'  Railroads  charging  fair  rates 
are  the  breathing-tubes  for  preventing  our  farmers 
smothering  in  their  own  plenty,  unable  to  sell  abroad 
their  surplus. 

"In  the  free-trade  markets  of  the  world  our 
farmers  are  now  in  sharp  competition  with  all  the 
pauper  labor  of  the  world  and  hold  their  own,  and 
export  more  in  value  than  all  our  manufacturers  do. 
This  competition  is  bound  to  grow  sharper,  notably 
when  semi-barbaric  countries  like  India  and  Russia 
come  to  employ  improved  machinery  in  farming,  and 
especially  when  large  organized  companies  use  these 
machines  on  large  tracts  and  territories.  For  instance, 
to  show  one  phase  of  the  danger,  I  cite  the  late 
wheat-raising  on  large  farms  in  California,  and  their 
saving  in  the  cost  of  growing  wheat.  The  statistics 
are  these:  on  ranches  of  1,000  acres,  cost  of  raising 
100  pounds  of  wheat,  92^  cents;  2,000  acres,  85 
cents  per  100  pounds;  6,000  acres,  75  cents;  15,000 


200  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

acres,  60  cents  ;  80,000  acres,  50  cents;  50,000  acres, 
40  cents.  These  facts  interpret  themselves  and 
show  that  the  time  is  at  hand  when  for  his  ow"n  pro- 
tection, yes,  and  existence,  the  wheat  farmer  must 
combine  with  his  neighbors  in  some  sort  of  co-opera- 
tive company,  something  like  the  cream-factories, 
which  he  has  found  so  profitable.  Or  take  the 
case  of  raising  fat  cattle  for  the  market,  under  what 
is  called  4  the  factory  sj^stem,'  carried  on  by  a  com- 
pany. Here  are  thousands  of  cattle  under  one  roof, 
fed  on  the  best  prepared  grains  and  fodder,  according 
to  scientific  principles,  where  everything  is  done  by 
steam,  from  watering  the  cattle  to  warming  the 
building;  where  one  laborer  can  take  care  of  200 
steers,  while  one  farmer,  under  his  ordinary  condi- 
tions, tends  only  15  or  20  head;  where  the  fat  made 
from  grain  is  not  blown  away  in  the  northwest  wind, 
but  maintained  by  the  warm,  well-aired  stable  from 
which  the  steers  only  go  out  to  be  transported  to 
the  slaughter-house;  where  economy  and  utilizing 
of  everything  are  carried  so  far  that  it  has  been  said 
that  from  the  beef  tongues  and  pigs'  feet  alone  the 
slaughter-house  company  would  make  a  good  dividend. 
There  is  much  slouchy  farming  in  this  country. 
How  can  it  compete  with  processes  like  these  just  de- 
scribed? It  must  go  out.  No  free  trade  or  any  other 
sort  of  trade  can  make  such  farming  pay ;  and  that 
farmer  is  entitled  to  nobody's  sympathy  who  does 
not  try  to  learn  his  calling.  He  must  put  brain  into 
his  brawn,  and  if  he  won't,  all  over  the  world,  he  will 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         201 

get  left  by  the  men  who  do.  If  the  American 
farmer  does,  he  can  stand  his  ground  anywhere.  He 
needs  an  open  road  and  an  open  door  into  his  foreign 
markets,  both  of  which  the  tariff  now  denies  him  ; 
to  have  tariff  taxes  which  he  now  crawls  under  taken 
off,  and  to  be  let  alone  in  his  struggle  in  the  great 
tide  of  civilization  which  is  sweeping  on,  and  leav- 
ing behind,  with  the  bats  and  owls,  the  lazy  and 
the  ignorant.  These  things  he  will  have  when 
he  demands  them  at  the  ballot-box,  and  not  one 
hour  before.  The  farmer  must  deliver  himself,  or 
remain  as  he  is.  He  has  his  destiny  in  his  own 
hands. 

"  He  cannot  greatly  further  his  cause  by  being 
hoodwinked  into  paying  extortionate  taxes,  under  a 
restrictive  or  so-called  'protective'  tariff,  by  being 
informed  by  his  protectionist  'friend'  that  he,  too, 
shares  the  benefit  of  protection's  universal  blessing, 
by  having  a  duty  placed  on  imports  of  his  produce. 
He  will  soon  see  that  while  our  exports  of  wheat 
amounted  in  1889  to  90,000,000  bushels,  our  imports 
of  wheat  in  1889  were  1,946  bushels  ;  that  while  we 
last  year  exported  69,000,000  bushels  of  corn,  we 
imported  in  the  same  .year  2,388  bushels  of  corn ; 
and  that  as  against  our  exports  of  rye,  our  imports 
were  just  16  bushels;  and  that,  therefore,  protection 
to  him  is  hollower  than  to  most  men.  When  he 
realizes  this,  he  will  see  that  in  this  merry  game  of 
protection,  where  each  man  has  his  hand  in  his  neigh- 
bur's  pocket  and  has  somebody's  hand  in  his,  so  that 


202  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

all  may  grow  rich  and  happy  together,  the  American 
farmer  rather  stands  at  the  end  of  the  line,  and 
while  plenty  of  hands  are  in  his  pocket,  he  has,  in 
turn,  and  can  have,  no  pocket  from  which  to  take  a 
recompense  for  his  loss." 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          203 


CHAPTER   XII. 

As  Mr.  Freeman  came  in  the  next  evening,  the  men 
were  very  busily  engaged  in  a  warm  discussion  rela- 
tive, as  he  afterwards  found  out,  to  the  merits  of  the 
tariff  positions  he  had  heretofore  assumed.  Further- 
more, when  he  took  his  chair  and  the  company  had 
subsided  into  silence  to  listen,  a  man  stood  forth,  as 
if  intending  speech.  He  was  the  man  mentioned  some 
evenings  before  as  meditating  the  gift  of  a  woollen 
blanket  to  his  grandbaby  at  Christmas,  and  that  baby 
had  that  very  day  been  buried.  The  man  was,  there- 
fore, in  his  best  clothes  and  clean-shaved,  in  contrast 
to  the  rest  of  his  group  in  their  work-day  suits.  He 
was  a  short,  stout,  broad-shouldered,  ruddy-faced 
man,  with  blue,  open,  honest  eyes,  of  a  retiring 
habit,  in  many  ways  a  fine  type  of  the  ancient  Saxon 
of  England,  as  that  blood  shows  in  these  days. 
Everybody  called  him  "  deacon  "  as  a  mark  of  respect, 
and  indeed  he  was  a  deacon  in  one  of  the  village 
churches,  and  was  always  treated  by  his  mates  ac- 
cordingly. 

"  Squire,"  he  said,  "I  want  to  say  something,  be- 
cause I  think  something.  I  can't  make  no  speech 
on  this  tariff,  because  I  don't  know  enough ;  but  I've 
took  in  all  you  say,  and  turned  it  over  at  home; 


204  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER  f 

nights  after  our  meet-in',  and  p'raps  what  I  think  has 
nothing  to  do  with  the  tariff,  but  it's  something  to 
do  with  me,  and  I  think  with  the  men  here,  and  so 
I've  risen  to  speak." 

"By  all  means,  deacon,"  replied  Mr.  Freeman, 
who  knew  him  for  a  man  of  gravity  and  sense.  "  Go 
on  as  long  as  you  like,  and  put  things  in  your  own 
way.  It's  a  comfort  to  have  men  speak  out  and  say 
something  which  they  have  ciphered  out  for  them- 
selves, because  that  shows  interest  and  thinking." 

"  Well,  this  is  it.  My  father  was  a  farmer,  and 
his  brothers  were  carpenters.  We  boys  was  brought 
up  to  work  from  sunrise  to  sunset,  and  wore  our 
work-clothes  all  days  except  Sabbath,  and  nobody 
thought  less  on  us  for  bein'  in  homespun.  My  old 
blue  woollen  frock  I  wore  on  the  farm  is  in  my  house 
yet.  My  father  and  his  brothers  all  lived  in  the  old 
house  together,  and  every  one  had  his  own  gun  to 
go  hun tin'  or  gunnin'  rainy  daj's,  and  stood  'em  up 
behind  the  kitchen  door,  fair  weather.  My  uncles 
owned  a  clarinet  and  flute  among  them,  and  my 
father  was  great  on  his  bass  viol.  So  they  played 
and  we  children  all  sung  together  the  old  hymns 
Sabbath  nights.  We  never  thought  we  were  poor 
or  laboring  folks,  as  we  are  called  nowadays;  we  paid 
our  taxes,  went  to  mill  and  meet-in',  we  never  looked 
up  to  anybody,  except  the  parson,  p'raps,  and  never 
looked  down  on  anybody  except  a  drunken  fellow  or 
a  fool.  Nobody  looked  up  or  clown  at  us,  as  good  as 
anybody,  and  everybody  as  good  as  us.  Things  have 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.          205 

changed  since  I  was  a  boy,  squire.  It  'pears  to  me 
as  if  folks  like  us  were  getting  to  be  the  under  dog, 
more  and  more,  like  as  if  we  were  less  respectable, 
somehow,  as  if  we  ourselves  were  gettin'  ashamed  of 
our  work-clothes;  and  our  girls  are  pouters  if  they 
can't  wear  all  sorts  of  finery  like  the  city  people. 
When  I  was  a  boy  everybody  spoke  to  everybody, 
and  we  all  seemed  alike  somehow,  free  and  equal. 
But  now,  when  I  am  goin'  home  in  my  work-clothes 
and  some  of  those  city  folks  ride  by  me,  with  a  man 
driving,  in  brass  buttons  and  a  band  round  a  high 
hat,  as  if  he  were  a  sort  of  drum-major,  and  the 
women  sittin'  up  and  lookin'  straight  ahead  saying 
nothin',  it  seems  to  me  as  if  they  and  I  were  differ- 
ent kinds  of  beings,  and  p'raps  I  some  sort  of  a 
creeter,  like  their  horses  are.  What's  the  matter, 
squire,  them  or  me  ?'? 

"  Well,  well,  deacon,"  replied  Mr.  Freeman,  smil- 
ing ;  "  if  I  have  to  say  anybody,  I  should  say  both  of 
you.  I  really  think,  nobody.  Those  fine  people  in 
their  carriage  and  you  in  your  work-clothes  are  both 
the  product,  the  creatures  of  your  times,  of  the 
civilization  in  which  .you  live,  which  is  always  chang- 
ing for  better  or  worse,  and  as  it  rises  makes  sharper 
distinctions,  on  the  outside  at  least,  between  classes. 
The  highway  belongs  to  both  of  you  alike.  If  they 
ride  and  you  walk,  they  have  the  same  right  to  their 
carriage,  unless  they  stole  it,  as  you  have  to  your 
feet.  But  why  some  men  ride  and  others  must  walk 
is  a  rather  large,  in  fact  a  deep,  question,  into  which 


206  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

I  do  not  care  to  wade.  You  have  stated  frankly 
what  you  feel  and  what  millions  of  workmen  feel, 
what  indeed  is  the  very  tap-root  of  the  unrest,  the 
dissatisfaction,  often  the  dangerous  theories  and 
movements,  of  the  men  who  toil.  This  dissatisfaction 
is  one  of  the  hopeful  signs  of  the  age,  for  if  the 
American  laborer  is  dissatisfied  with  his  condition  he 
has  sense  enough  to  try  and  make  it  better  in  some 
decent  way.  To  smash  other  people's  carriages  will 
not  build  your  own.  Why  don't  you  buy  your  own 
carriage  ?  You  say  you  have  no  money.  Well,  the 
other  people  have.  The  Declaration  of  Independ- 
ence never  guaranteed  you  anything  but  a  fair  and 
equal  right  to  get  on  or  to  go  down,  according  to 
your  ability  and  industry;  liberty  to  walk  or  ride  as 
you  can  afford.  The  highway  of  life  is  for  all, 
horsemen  and  footmen,  to  fare  as  they  can  or  choose, 
nowhere  more  so  than  in  the  United  States ;  and 
the  root  curse  of  this  tariff  is  that  it  pays  for  one 
man's  carriage  out  of  some  other  man's  pocket,  and 
so  defies  the  law  of  the  land,  making  war  on  that 
approaching  civilization  wherein  riches  and  poverty 
are  poured  out  of  the  hand  of  Justice  without  fear 
or  favor,  according  as  men  deserve  them  or  are  by 
law  entitled  to  them. 

"There  is  another  side  to  this  vast  question  —  this 
question  of  what  is  to  become  of  the  toiling  masses 
under  the  new  civilization  which  is  now  upon  us  and 
will  stay  long  among  men,  which  you  and  the  labor- 
ing-man ought  to  look  at,  deacon,  which  every  friend 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         207 

of  labor  must  never  forget.  It  is  this :  What  is  the 
laborev  going  to  be,  a  man,  or  a  -serf  to  his  needs,  or 
some  other  man's  greed?  Under  the  inevitable  in- 
equalities of  our  money-getting  civilization,  some 
will  be  rich  and  others  poor  as  long  as  man  is.  You 
cannot  make  the  human  race  level  either  in  what 
they  are  or  in  what  they  have.  But  the  wise  man 
will  always  try  to  level  up,  not  down.  He  will  not 
try  to  pull  another  man  out  of  Tils  carriage,  but  will, 
if  he  likes,  try  and  pull  himself  into  one  of  his  own. 
The  fine  lady  who  rode  past  you  with  her  coachman 
in  livery  might  have  been  a  lady,  or  she  might  have 
been  a  very  vulgar  person  keeping  a  boarding-house 
in  the  oil  regions,  whom  her  husband  married  to  pay 
his  board-bill  the  day  before  he  fell  upon  an  oil-well 
and  a  fortune  at  the  same  time,  by  a  lucky  accident ; 
and  she  is  out  enjoying  her  luck  in  the  way  you 
saw.  It  is  not  the  carriage,  but  the  man  in  it,  that 
counts. 

"  The  new  civilization  both  helps1  and  hurts.  It 
makes  sharp  contrasts  between  the  man  in  a  carriage 
and  the  man  on  foot.  Yet  in  a  street-car,  thanks  to 
progress,  for  a  nickel,  the  laborer  can  ride  to  his 
day's  work  as  easily  and  as  quickly  as  a  rich  dame 
can  ride  in  her  carriage  to  the  opera ;  and  on  a  rail- 
road one  can,  for  a  few  dollars,  ride  in  more  magnifi- 
cence and  faster  than  any  king  from  Pharaoh  to 
Charlemagne.  And  what  I  say  is,  that  the  man  on 
foot  must  deserve  a  carriage  if  he  can't  own  one,  if 
he  expects  to  be  treated  astiwefeggfe^Labor  must 


208  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

lift  up  itself  into  honor  by  honor !  No  government 
care,  no  philanthropy,  no  patronage  from  any  quar- 
ter, will  do  the  job.  I  say,  men,  that  the  laboring 
classes  must  work  out  their  own  salvation.  You 
must  educate  yourselves  and  your  children.  You 
must  be  true  to  your  own  manhood  by  insisting  that 
it  shall  be  wise  and  virtuous.  You  must  take  your 
share  in  governing  this  nation,  and  you  must  know 
the  why  and  the  how.  This  is  why  I  have  taken 
the  trouble  of  all  these  tariff  talks.  You  must  study 
this  question  which  is  upon  us,  and  understand  it. 
There  is  no  excuse  for  you  if  you  don't.  This  land 
belongs  to  the  masses  —  it  is  a  democracy  —  and 
when  the  masses  do  not  study  the  weal  and  the  way 
of  American  democracy,  they  commit  high  treason 
against  their  own  birthright.  A  laboring-man  igno- 
rant of  his  political  duties,  or  careless  of  them,  is  an 
enemy  to  the  right  hand  of  toil." 

"  Tell  us,  squire,"  said  one,  "  why  the  Republican 
party  can't  change  this  here  tariff  jiut  as  well  as  the 
Democrats  can?" 

"  For  several  reasons,"  answered  the  squire ;  "  first, 
because  the  Democratic  party  has  got  the  start  of 
them,  and,  like  the  man  in  the  Bible,  has  gone  down 
to  the  healing  waters  before  them.  The  Democratic 
party,  for  at  least  ninety  years,  has  been  a  low- 
tariff  party,  and,  under  the  leadership  of  Mr.  Cleve- 
land, has  taken  up  its  old  position,  and  so  has  got 
the  inside  track.  Men  say  the  tariff  question  is  a 
matter  of  every  man's  bread  and  butter,  and  there- 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS    TAXES.        209 

fore  should  never  have  been  carried  into  politics,  but 
settled  by  the  examination  and  agreement  of  the 
honest  men  of  all  parties.  That  is  all  true,  so  far 
as  it  goes ;  but  the  other  fact  is,  that  as  our  laws  are 
made  by  the  people,  and  as  the  people  must  work 
through  parties  to  carry  out  their  will,  it  is  inevi- 
table that  the  tariff  question  should  be  settled  at 
the  polls.  I  have  said,  and  I  say  it  again,  that  the 
Republican  masses  are  just  as  anxious  for  just  and 
wholesome  laws  as  the  Democrats  can  be.  The 
trouble  is  that  the  Republican  party  has  been  led 
into  a  false  position,  and  must  either  break  away 
from  the  party  on  the  tariff  issue,  or  go  against  the 
country.  The  Republican  leaders  will  never  alter 
this  present  tariff  for  the  better,  simply  because  they 
cannot.  They  may  tinker  it,  pretend  to  make  it 
better  by  making  it  higher;  may  take  off  some 
duties  which  don't  count  much  anyway ;  try  to 
hoodwink  the  ignorant  voters  with  some  trick,  and 
then  appeal  to  party  pride  to  carry  them  through  ; 
but  as  soon  as  they  touch  one  stone  of  it  —  give  one 
more  free  raw  material  to  the  people,  the  whole  pro- 
tection fallacy  vanishes  in  smoke.  They  are,  indeed, 
between  the  Devil  and  the  deep  sea.  Besides,  in  the 
last  two  presidential  campaigns,  certain  of  the  Repub- 
lican leaders  and  their  National  Committee  have 
been  under  a  contract  with  the  monopolists  and  ex- 
tortionists of  the  protection  injustice.  The  terms  of 
that  contract  are  that  the  monopolists  shall  give 
them  money,  and  they  shall  give  the  monopolists  a 


210  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

protective  tariff.  That  is  the  size  of  the  'deal;' 
the  American  laborer  is  disparaged  for  the  benefit  of 
the  'pauper  laborer'  of  Europe,  for  the  sake  of  the 
dust  that  can  be  thrown  in  the  eyes  of  well-meaning 
people,  who  honestly  wish  well  to  labor,  and  don't 
see  the  trick.  Therefore  the  Republican  leaders 
must  deliver  the  goods  and  are  trying  to  do  so.  If 
they  fail  to  deliver,  where  is  the  monopolists'  money, 
and  where  is  the  next  Republican  President?" 

"What  would  happen,  squire,  if  all  the  tariff,  ex- 
cept enough  to  pay  our  government  bills,  was  taken 
off?  What  would  happen  to  us?  "  asked  another. 

"Well,"  said  the  squire,  laughing,  "there  would 
be  a  great  surprise  party  for  somebody ;  the  biggest 
kind  of  one  for  the  honest  protectionist  deceived  for 
a  lifetime  by  the  protection  fallacies.  Wages  would 
go  up  and  be  more  regular  —  fewer  shut-downs  ;  and 
the  consumer's  money  would  purchase  many  more 
comforts,  because  there  would  be  a  fall  in  the  prices 
of  most  things  which  a  man  consumes,  leaving  sub- 
stantially the  same  margin  of  profit  for  the  honest 
producer  or  manufacturer.  Take  the  Ohio  wool- 
grower,  for  instance — not  the  Republican  politi- 
cians of  Ohio  who  shear  the  silly  sheep  of  their 
constituencies,  first  frightening  them  into  their  sheep- 
pens  with  the  bugbear  of  free  trade.  The  price  of 
his  wool  under  this  tariff  is  and  has  been  low.  The 
next  morning  after  wool  is  made  free,  or  it  is  evident 
that  it  is  going  to  be  in  the  United  States,  he  will  be 
very  much  surprised  to  find  that  wool  has  risen  in 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         211 

price,  and  his  own  clip  with  it,  in  every  market  of 
the  world.  Why?  Simply  because  there  is,  and 
must  be  at  all  times,  a  limited  amount  of  wool  in 
the  world,  and  every  pound  of  it  costs  money ;  and 
the  wool-dealers,  knowing  that  the  United  States 
with  free  wool  will  require  more  wool,  because  their 
wool  manufactures  are  going  to  increase  largely, 
with  this  greater  demand  in  sight,  will  ask  a  bigger 
price,  and  will  get  it,  too.  Europe  will  still  need,  to 
say  the  least,  a  little  wool  for  her  own  markets,  and 
America  can  no  more  get  all  the  wool  than  she  will 
get  all  the  sun  or  the  sea.  When  England  made 
wool  free,  wool  went  up,  because  there  was  more 
demand  for  it.  When  France  put  a  tariff  tax  of  22 
per  cent  on  wool  it  went  down,  probably  because  its 
manufacturers  couldn't  get  out  in  the  face  of  the 
free  wool  manufacturers  of  England." 

"  But  wouldn't  we  be  inundated  by  all  these  free 
things  coming  in  on  us  and  shutting  up  our  shops 
and  throwing  the  men  out  of  work?"  asked  one  in 
the  audience. 

"No,  and  I  will  tell  you  why.  Your  question 
shows  that  you  have  let  one  of  those  false  metaphors, 
of  which  I  spoke  to  you  long  ago,  run  away  with 
your  judgment.  That  metaphor  falsely  assumes 
that  foreign  goods  are  like  the  sea.  They  aren't. 
The  sea  costs  nothing,  and  there  is  no  end  to  it. 
Foreign  goods  cost,  and  the  stock  soon  runs  out 
unless  replenished,  and  to  replenish  costs  money 
again.  Europe  is  not  going  to  give  away  her  goods 


212  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

to  the  Yankee,  but  sell  them,  and  the  Yankee  is  not 
going  to  buy  unless  he  can  make  a  cent  on  the 
trade.  A  serious  increase  of  a  demand  for  any  line 
of  goods  from  the  United  States  would  instantly 
raise  the  price  abroad.  Trade  is  like  the  atmosphere, 
which,  with  its  currents  and  counter-currents,  is 
always  tending  to  an  equilibrium,  unless  hindered 
by  tariff  taxes.  It  is  in  this  hindering  of  the  equi- 
librium of  trade  that  a  protective  tariff  must  always 
make  a  deal  of  trouble.  Besides,  with  free  trade,  the 
tide  would  set  out  from  this  land  —  not  in.  I  have 
shown  you  that  when  the  hand  of  American  labor  is 
unchained,  when  we  are  indeed  free  men  in  our  trade 
—  as  we  are  not  now,  but  slaves  to  the  tariff — we 
shall  surely  gain  the  mastery  in  the  markets  of  the 
world.  Mr.  Gladstone  thinks  and  says  so,  than  whom 
no  man  on  tiie  globe  better  knows  the  laws  of  trade. 

"  Now  I  am  going  back  to  answer  the  question, 
further,  of  what  would  happen  to  us  if  we  had  free 
trade  in  the  United  States?  First,  it  would  quicken 
all  trade  —  increase  our  exports  and  imports  —  give 
more  steady  employment  to  our  people,  and  in  most 
cases  better  wages,  because  there  would  be  a  vastly 
greater  demand  for  work. 

UI  know  a  friend  of  mine,  an  intelligent  business 
man,  who  objects  to  free  trade  because  it  would 
make  us  the  greatest  manufacturing  country  in  the 
world ;  and  he  doesn't  happen  to  like  the  influence 
which  large  manufacturing  centres,  like  Manchester 
and  Birmingham,  exercise  on  national  character." 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         213 

"But  wouldn't  a  change  "of  tariff  upset  things?" 
asked  another  auditor. 

"  Undoubtedly,  but  only  for  the  better.  This 
tariff  is  like  an  old  machine  which  we  intend  to  re- 
place with  a  better,  in  order  to  fare  better.  Sir 
James  Stewart  said,  in  1767,  that  it  is  impossible 
to  sweep  out  any  room  without  raising  some  dust ; 
but  then  the  room  is  better  for  the  sweeping.  Busi- 
ness is  a  perpetual  series  of  changes,  as  every  busi- 
ness man  will  tell  you.  You  can  no  more  do  a 
healthy  business,  for  any  length  of  time,  under  this 
old  barbarous  tariff,  this  discredited  relic  of  de- 
throned tyranny  of  a  thousand  years  ago,  than  you 
can  make  money  in  a  factory  that  employs  worn-out 
or  antiquated  machinery.  A  tariff  reform,  such  as 
I  have  argued,  unless  the  history  of  the  industries  of 
the  world  is  a  misleading  lie,  would  be,  in  short,  a 
blessing  to  labor  and  capital  alike. 

"  Now  I  wish  to  point  out  to  you  two  tremendous 
dangers  which  this  American  tariff  is  steadily  devel- 
oping against  the  American  Union.  I  say  this  ad- 
visedly. Weigh  well  now  what  I  say  and  think  it 
all  over.  This  Union  forms  one  nation,  and  all 
legislation  should  be  had  in  the  interests  of  the  whole 
nation,  not  of  any  section  of  it.  Ours  is  a  Congress 
of  the  whole  nation,  riot  the  Congress  of  a  section. 
The  flag  is  for  one  nation,  not  for  a  section  of  it.  But, 
ignoring  this  root  fact  of  our  government,  our  Con- 
gressmen, in  this  protection  craze  and  gluttony,  and 
as  against  their  oath,  are  forever  trying  to  pass  laws 


214  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

for  the  advantage  of  their  own  section.  Thus  more 
and  more  they  are  arraying  section  against  section, 
and  so  tending  to  destroy  again  that  Union  which 
our  soldiers  and  sailors  died  to  maintain.  Under 
any  laws  of  trade,  sectionalism  in  a  country  as  vast 
as  ours,  and  with  such  differing  local  interests,  con- 
sidering what  human  nature  is,  will  be  always  a 
strain  upon  the  bonds  which  bind  us  into  one  nation. 
Western  interests  differ  from  the  Eastern.  So  do  the 
Southern,  and  the  South  is  more  allied  by  its  agri- 
cultural interests  with  the  West  than  with  the  East- 
ern States  and  Middle  States.  Future  political 
power  to  control  national  legislation  lies  west  of  the 
Mississippi.  Suppose  in  some  future,  far  off  or  near, 
the  West  and  the  South  should  join  forces  against 
the  East.  Would  or  could  the  East  buy  or  fight  its 
way  to  victory  against  these  two  confederated  sec- 
tions? No!  Any  honest  tariff  reform  should  never 
recognize  any  State  or  section  ;  it  must  recognize  the 
one  only  nation  we  are.  In  the  administration  of 
the  affairs  of  a  republic,  justice  is  stronger  than 
armies,  fair  dealing  as  between  sections  and  peoples 
a  stronger  bond  of  union  than  the  sword.  The 
American  tariff,  as  it  is,  tends  to  sectionalism  and 
the  rupture  of  the  Union. 

"But,  men,  there  is  a  graver  and  more  deeply 
reaching  tendency  to  which  I  desire  to  call  your 
attention,  and  which  I  touched  on  lightly  when  I 
replied  to  the  deacon's  remarks.  I  am  not  an  alarm- 
ist or  given  to  seeing  danger  where  none  exists. 


OR,   OUR    TARIFF  AND  ITS  TAXES.         215 

But  I  am  compelled  to  say  that  much  which  I  see  in 
the  trend  of  these  protectionist  ideas  fills  me  with 
the  deepest  apprehension.  At  this  moment,  the 
volcanic  elements  of  misrule  and  disorder  on  which 
the  thin  crust  of  society  rests  are  seething,  and 
threaten  eruption.  Just  how  far  our  constant 
drift  toward  broader  democratic  institutions  will 
extend,  I  do  not  know ;  it  is  impossible  to  predict. 
But  I  believe  that  many  objects  for  which  earnest,  if 
deluded,  men  are  struggling  to-day,  are  not  for  the 
interest  of  the  people.  In  my  opinion,  Socialism,  in 
its  many  forms,  from  slight  reforms,  through  the  mild 
insanity  of  Bellamy,  to  the  frenzied  ravings  of  the 
anarchists,  presents  a  most  serious  menace.  How- 
ever these  forms  of  Socialism  may  differ  from  each 
other,  they  are  united  in  one  very  important  partic- 
ular. They  all  turn  toward  society  in  its  corporate 
capacity,  in  other  words,  to  the  government,  as  a 
panacea  for  all  social  inequalities  and  evils.  Instead 
of  self-help  as  a  means  of  raising  man  above  his 
wants  or  needs,  Socialism  offers  the  wisdom  of  the 
state  or  government  exerting  an  all-potent  influence 
in  radiating,  like  a  central  sun,  all  sorts  of  blessings : 
high  wages,  high  prices,  and  the  possession  of  prop- 
erty and  prosperity.  It  is  a  part  of  this  theory  that 
the  government  should  extend  its  powers.  That, 
instead  of  protecting  men  in  their  individual  efforts 
in  such  freedom  as  is  consistent  with  the  equal 
rights  of  others,  which  the  founders  of  our  govern- 
ment considered  a  necessary  limitation  of  its  powers, 


216  WHAT'S   THE  MATTER? 

the  state  should  enter  upon  a  career  of  doing  every- 
body's business,  and  giving  all  an  equal  share  in  the 
national  estate.  It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  this  plan 
is  extremely  pleasing  to  many,  especially  to  those 
who  are  not  workers,  but  who,  at  least  in  their  own 
opinion,  would  be  greatly  and  immediately  benefited 
by  it;  in  other  words,  to  those  whose  share  would 
be  most  largely  increased  if  everything  were  equally 
divided.  Now  modern  society  is  not  perfect,  but  it 
has  made  .some  progress  and  amassed  some  wealth, 
and  this  has  been  done  upon  the  plan  of  encourag- 
ing and  protecting  individual  effort,  by  guaranteeing 
ownership  of  its  product.  The  other  plan  is  for  the 
government  to  take  everything  and  direct  every- 
thing. The  growth  of  sentiment  in  favor  of  this 
second  plan  is  visible  in  many  ways,  and  appears  in 
many  quarters.  If  you  like  this  plan,  well  and 
good.  If  you  do  not,  if  you,  each  of  you,  want  to 
stand  as  a  man  and  earn  an  honest  living  and  be 
able  to  enjoy  as  your  own  the  result  of  your  labor  in 
your  own  little  home,  then  it  is  for  you  to  consider 
that  in  a  country  where  the  majority  rule  and  many 
men  are  daily  growing  poorer  and  more  desperate, 
there  is  a  very  real  danger  in  an}7  tendency  which 
subordinates  individual  effort  to  government  sup- 
port, which  teaches  men  to  rel}r  less  upon  their  own 
exertions  than  upon  such  laws  as  they  can  get  passed 
for  their  benefit.  The  effect  of  any  such  tendency 
is  not  obviated  by  any  opinion  you  personally  may 
have  that  it  is  encouraged  in  any  particular  instance 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         217 

for  an  object  that  you  may  happen  to  believe  in. 
Men  differ  honestly  in  opinion,  and  the  same  govern- 
ment aid  which  you  ask  for  an  object  you  think 
worthy,  you  are  teaching  men  to  ask  for  in  aid  of 
objects  which  you,  and  possibly  all  right-minded 
men,  would  regard  as  dangerous  and  unworthy.  If  the 
government  is  for  the  purpose  of  supporting  the  peo- 
ple, then  all  kinds  of  people  are  fairly  entitled  to 
support.  Therefore,  it  is  not  the  least  of  the  objec- 
tions which  I  have  to  the  course  of  many  of  our 
Republican  politicians,  that  they  are  daily  teaching, 
in  the  face  of  all  men,  the  dangerous  lesson  that  the 
government  should  do  for  any  set  of  men  who  can 
command  the  necessary  votes,  what  they  well  might 
do  for  themselves.  When  Senator  Blair,  for  exam- 
ple, wants  the  government  to  educate  the  citizens  of 
certain  States  who  well  could  educate  themselves ; 
when  Senator  Frye  proposes  to  make  shipping  prof- 
itable, by  paying  the  people's  money  to  ship-owners, 
in  the  form  of  bounties ;  when  the  able-bodied  vete- 
rans of  the  war  are  asked  to  beg  for  the  people's 
money  for  a  support  they  well  might  earn ;  it  is  clear 
you  are  drifting  away  from  the  ancient  landmarks. 
Whither  are  you  going  ?  These  may  all  be  objects 
which  you  personally  fancy,  but  these  men,  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously,  are  teaching  a  lesson  that 
many  will  be  quick  to  learn,  viz. :  '  Look  to  your 
government  for  help  rather  than  rely  on  yourself. 
Be  a  mendicant  rather  than  a  man.'  And,  above  all, 
when  business  men,  in  every  line  of  trade,  besiege 


218  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER? 

congressional  committees  to  make  their  business 
pay  by  confiscating  for  their  benefit  other  people's 
money  in  the  form  of  taxation,  so  that  national 
charity  rather  than  personal  exertion  is  relied  on  as 
the  sure  means  of  success,  the  men  who  ask  and  the 
men  who  grant  are  in  unison  with  the  socialist  or 
the  nationalist  in  declaring  that  the  proper  fountain 
of  plenty  is  the  government.  If  these  men  can  get 
what  they  want,  as  they  do,  how  can  they  deny  men 
who  chance  to  want  something  else  from  the  gov- 
ernment which  they  do  not  happen  to  like,  —  an 
income  tax  to  increase  wages,  for  instance  ?  I  can 
imagine  the  ready  answer  of  such  an  one  when  con- 
fronted by  a  protest  from  the  protected  manufac- 
turer, his  allies,  or  his  dupes.  4  You  taught  me  the 
lesson  yourself.  It  was  you,  the  monopolistic  manu- 
facturer of  this  country,  who  first  clearly  showed 
that  the  way  to  amass  a  fortune  was  to  get  the  rep- 
resentatives of  the  people  to  vote  you  my  money. 
Now  these  are  my  representatives,  and  they  vote  me 
your  money.  You  cannot  justly  blame  me  if  I  am 
taught  by  your  example,  or  exasperated  by  your 
quiet  little  game,  so  far  as  to  employ  the  same 
method  by  which  you  got  these  unrighteous  gains,  to 
divide  them  among  us  whom  you  so  long  have 
robbed.'  What  satisfactory  answer  is  there?  But 
one :  '  They  who  sow  the  wind,  shall  reap  the  whirl- 
wind.' 

"Now,  men,  I  am  going  to  end  these  talks  to- 
night.    I  will  end  this  way.     I  am  almost  ashamed 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.         219 

of  myself  that  in  these  tariff  talks  I  have  looked  so 
much  on  the  'bread  and  butter '  side  of  the  question, 
and  neglected  the  history,  the  ethics,  and  the  relig- 
ious aspects  of  it.  Believe  me,  they  are  all  there. 
The  tariff  struggle  in  which  this  nation  is  now  in- 
volved is  only  an  evolution  of  the  national  life 
which  moves  on  to  its  destiny.  This  evolution  con- 
nects itself  with  the  national  history  of  all  those 
who  speak  the  English  tongue.  There  are  two 
great  epochs  in  all  nations  moving  on  to  a  completed 
liberty.  The  first  epoch  is  when  a  nation  demands 
political  liberty  ;  the  second  when  it  demands  eco- 
nomic liberty  —  its  liberty  in  trade.  The  first  epoch 
came  to  England  when  Englishmen  beheaded  their 
king  and  decided  that  Hampden's  ship  tax  was  void 
in  English  law ;  the  second  when  England,  led  by 
Bright  and  Cobden,  took  off  taxes  laid  by  English 
landlords  upon  the  people's  bread  and  left  England's 
trade  free  to  grow  to  greatness  such  as  the  world 
had  never  seen.  The  first  epoch  came  to  us  in  our 
war  of  the  Revolution,  based  upon  an  unjust  tax 
levied  on  our  feeble  colonies ;  the  second  epoch  is 
now  upon  us  in  this  tariff  business,  and  men  like  me 
insist  that  we  will  trade  free,  as  Nature  and  God  have 
helped  us.  I  know  the  odds  are,  at  the  start,  against 
us ;  rich  monopolies  thoroughly  organized  to  spend 
money  to  influence  votes  and  legislation,  and  voiced 
in  Congress  by  Republican  leaders  with  the  fillet  of 
a  broken  pledge  bound  upon  their  foreheads ;  and, 
above  all,  the  thoughtless  apathy  or  ignorance  of 


220  WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  f 

many  of  the  people  themselves.  On  our  side  we 
have  the  Democratic  party  arid  their  great  leader, 
Grover  Cleveland,  which,  as  of  old,  putting  its  heart 
to  the  people's  needs,  demands  for  the  many  against 
the  few,  in  that  old  patriotism  which  has  kept  it 
alive  for  ninety  years  while  all  its  old  antagonists 
are  dead  or  dying,  fair  play  and  equal  justice  for  all 
sections  and  all  the  people.  On  our  side,  we  have 
the  history  of  trade,  the  facts  of  Nature,  in  air, 
earth,  and  under  the  sea ;  and  above  all  the  con- 
science of  the  nation,  when  it  becomes  attentive  and 
enlightened.  Revolutions  never  go  backwards. 
The  economic  revolution  in  the  United  States  is  far 
on  its  way  and  will  not  be  denied  its  demand. 

"  The  protection  fallacies  have  been  disproved  ten 
thousand  times,  and  our  tariff  robberies  stand  con- 
victed before  our  courts,  oar  civilization,  and  the 
honest  intelligence  of  mankind.  Whoever  wishes 
can  verify  all  this  for  himself,  and  is  bound,  as  a 
good  citizen,  to  an  examination.  The  time  has  now 
come  when  we  must  put  the  national  conscience, 
attentive  and  instructed,  squarely  against  this  tariff 
business.  The  teachers  of  religion  themselves  can- 
not afford  to  remain  dumb  dogs  before  a  Moloch  of 
cruelty  and  injustice  oppressing  the  poor  and  the 
defenceless,  unless  they  are  willing  to  accept  a  con- 
tempt for  all  religion  from  the  millions,  whom  they 
desert.  For  the  religion  that  deserts  the  people  is 
deserted  by  the  people. 

"I    have    read    of    insults    offered    to    Russian 


OR,   OUR   TARIFF  AND  ITS   TAXES.        221 

ladies  in  Siberia,  who,  to  escape  greater  outrage, 
killed  themselves;  and  of  how  unarmed  Russian 
gentlemen,  in  other  prisons,  died,  under  the  fire  of 
Russian  rifles,  in  useless  revolt  to  avenge  the  same. 
Now,  then,  I  say  if,  under  such  shame,  the  archbishop 
of  all  the  Russias  and  the  clerics  beneath  his  gilded 
domes  at  Moscow  utter  no  plain  anathema  on  all 
such  horrors,  with  his  'Thus  saith  the  Lord,'  it  re- 
sults that  Russia  comes  to  despise  the  priest  and 
even  the  Master  before  whose  altars  that  priest  so 
falsely  serves.  What  is  true  in  Russia  is  true  in 
these  United  States." 

While  Mr.  Freeman  was  saying  this,  he  had  risen 
from  his  chair  and  gone  in  among  the  men,  who 
made  way  and  now  stood  around  him.  They 
noticed  his  white  face  and  firm  lips. 

"  No,  my  men,"  he  went  on,  "  from  Pharaoh  to 
Charles  I. — yes,  and  till  to-day  —  the  many  gave 
and  the  few  took  what  they  would.  I  say  this 
world  belongs,  not  to  hierarchies,  dynasties,  or 
monopolies,  but  to  the  peoples  of  the  world  —  to  the 
many,  not  to  the  crafty  few.  I  say  the  peoples  must 
come  to  their  own  by  their  own  intelligence  and 
virtue,  all  good  men  assisting.  Free,  wise,  honest 
speech  must  be  the  only  axe  to  strike  the  neck  of 
Wrong  ;  intelligence  and  virtue  the  only  soldiers  to 
win  the  people's  victory.  This  tariff  is  a  gigantic 
mediaeval  robber  which  is  destroying  all  of  us.  The 
majority  of  our  present  Congress  would  not  listen 
to  an  archangel  speaking  in  our  behalf.  Let  them 


222  WHATS   THE  MATTER? 

hear,  then,  the  rustle  of  the  people's  ballots,  driving 
them  out  and  putting  better  men  in." 

They  have  been  studying  the  tariff  question 
down  in  Rabham  for  some  time  now  in  a  working- 
men's  club.  Most  have  got  on  no  little  way 
with  their  lesson.  And  if  any  politician  goes  down 
there  talking  protection,  there  are  plenty  of  mechan- 
ics who  will  ask  him,  on  the  spot,  his  reasons.  The 
questions  are  sure  to  be  so  blunt  and  searching  that 
he  is  very  likely  to  take  an  early  train  back  to  some 
community  not  so  well  instructed.  As  Hen  Farmer 
is  now  accustomed  to  say,  "  Our  eye  teeth  is  cut." 


NOTES. 


I.     AVERAGE    DUTY. 

(Page  30.) 

THIS  matter,  about  which  some  little  misunder- 
standing exists,  is  concisely  stated  by  the  New 
York  Journal  of  Commerce,  an  entirely  reliable 
authority,  — 

We  stated  some  days  ago  that  the  present  tariff  averaged 
for  the  year  1887  just  47.10  per  cent  on  all  dutiable  imports, 
and  that  the  proposed  Mills  tariff,  on  the  same  reckoning, 
would  bring  this  average  down  to  about  40|  per  cent. 

As  the  duties  only  averaged  18|  per  cent  when  the  war  broke 
out,  and  the  average  from  1830  to  1862,  a  period  of  32  years, 
was  only  31.42,  or  about  31|  per  cent,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the 
Mills  bill,  with  its  40|  per  cent,  is  still  a  very  high  rate  of  tax- 
ation, with  no  suggestion  of  free  trade  in  it,  an  ample  protec- 
tion for  every  manufacturer  in  the  country.  The  highest  range 
of  the  old  protective  tariff,  so  dear  to  the  disciples  of  the  Carey 
school,  was  35  per  cent,  and  we  heard  Mr.  Carey  say  in  one  of 
his  most  earnest  pleas  in  behalf  of  protection,  that  35  per  cent 
for  an  infant  industry  and  25  per  cent  after  a  few  years  of 
progress  was  all  that  any  manufacturer  ought  to  desire.  What 
shall  be  thought  of  a  man  who  asserts  that  a  40|  per  cent  tariff 
is  an  attempt  to  establish  free  trade,  simply  because  it  follows 
an  excessive  war  tariff  averaging  47.10  per  cent? 

In  regard  to  this  *  *  average  "  we  find  that  the  word  is  very 
much  misunderstood.  A  very  intelligent  gentleman  has  writ- 
ten us  a  letter  upon  it,  from  which  we  make  the  following 
extract:  "I  have  frequently  noticed  in  the  press  the  statement 
that  the  so-called  war  tariff  imposes  an  average  duty  of  47£ 
per  centum.  Will  you  be  kind  enough  to  explain  the  meaning 
of  this,  how  the  *  average '  is  ascertained,  and  whether  the  con- 
version of  specific  duties  into  their  ad  valorem  equivalents 
enters  into  the  statement?  Are  the  articles  in  the  free  list 


224  NOTES. 

taken  into  the  account  ?  Finally,  do  you  know  anything  that  lies 
like  an  average  ? "  There  has  been  much  said  to  which  the 
word  in  italics  may  fitly  apply,  but  the  statement  of  the  **  aver- 
age" of  the  duty  is  free  from  that  charge. 

Our  correspondent  evidently  supposes  that  some  one  has 
taken  a  copy  of  the  tariff  and  therefrom  made  an  average  of 
the  charges  to  be  collected.  But  the  percentage  has  been 
obtained  by  a  much  simpler  process.  Suppose  a  merchant 
sells  a  great  variety  of  goods  during  a  day,  some  at  10  per 
cent  profit  and  some  at  100  per  cent  gain,  and  at  night  he 
finds  he  has  sold  by  strict  account  goods  that  cost  him  just  $1,- 
000  and  has  received  for  them  $1,500,  which  he  has  in  the 
drawer.  He  does  not  get  at  his  average  profit  by  adding  the 
10,  20  and  100  percentages  together,  but  by  a  shorter  calcula- 
tion. If  goods  costing  $1,000  bring  $1,500,  he  has  made  an 
average  profit  of  50  per  cent,  and  there  is  no  "  lying"  about  it. 

This  is  precisely  the  way  the  average  rate  of  duty  is  ascer- 
tained. No  free  goods  are  included,  but  only  the  goods  that 
pay  a  duty  and  pass  into  consumption.  If  upon  a  dutiable 
value,  as  summed  up  in  the  entries  at  the  Custom  House, 
amounting  to  $600,000,000  cash  duties,  reaching  in  all  the  sum 
of  $300,000,000,  had  been  collected,  the  average  would  be  50 
per  cent;  but  if  only  $282,600,000  had  been  received,  the 
average  is  precisely  47.10  per  cent.  The  entries  of  dutiable 
goods  are  all  added  together.  The  total  of  dutiable  goods 
entered  directly  for  consumption,  and  the  total  withdrawn  from 
warehouse  for  the  market,  make  together  the  total  value 
on  which  the  duties  are  levied.  By  adding  these  together  and 
finding  at  the  end  of  the  year  how  much  money  they  have  all 
paid  in  the  way  of  duty,  we  know  to  a  cent  what  the  average 
duty  has  been.  There* is  no  guessing  and  there  is  no  "  lying" 
about  it,  unless  some  one  starts  up  and  says  that  40|  per  cent 
collected  in  this  way  is  free  trade ! 

The  net  free  imports  into  the  United  States  for  the  fiscal 
year  1887  were  $228,515,977,  upon  which,  of  course,  no  duty 
was  levied.  The  net  dutiable  imports  which  passed  into  con- 
sumption, and  upon  which  the  duties  were  levied,  were  $454,- 
824,436,  upon  which  an  average  duty  of  47.10  per  cent 
brought  $214,222,309  in  customs,  which  was  received  into  the 
public  treasury  in  actual  cash.  This  is  the  way  the  "  average  " 
is  ascertained,  and  as  the  government  received  the  money,  and 
must  account  for  it,  the  amount  cannot  be  overstated. 


NOTES.  225 

II.     REPUBLICAN    OPINIONS. 

(Page  36.) 

Mr.  McCulloch's  views  are  neatly  summarized  in 
his  letter  to  a  Philadelphia  taiiff  meeting,  dated  Jan- 
uary 25,  1888,  — 

The  tariff  question  is  an  economical  question,  and  it  would 
be  an  immense  gain  to  the  people  if  it  were  lifted  out  of  poli- 
tics and  considered  as  such  a  question  ought  to  be,  with  regard 
to  its  bearings  upon  great  national  interests.  The  present  tariff 
was  created  when  the  government  was  engaged  in  a  war  of 
unparalleled  magnitude,  for  the  maintenance  of  its  rightful 
authority.  It  has  accomplished  the  object  for  which  it  was 
created,  and  now  needs  careful  revision  to  accommodate  it  to 
the  present  conditions  of  the  country.  The  surplus  which  it 
produces  and  locks  up  in  the  treasury,  to  the  detriment  of  busi- 
ness, is  only  one  of  the  many  serious  objections  to  it. 

It  is  greatly  prejudicial  to  our  great  farming  interests  by 
gradually,  but  effectively,  diminishing  the  foreign  demand  for 
our  agricultural  productions  at  remunerative  prices.  It  stands 
in  the  way  of  the  restoration  of  our  shipping  interests  by  duties 
upon  many  articles  which  are  needed  in  shipbuilding.  It  is 
anti-republican  in  its  character  and  its  influences,  it  fosters 
monopolies,  and  it  "enriches  the  few  at  the  expense  of  the 
many."  It  violates  the  constitution  of  the  United  States,  inas- 
much as  upon  many  articles  duties  are  imposed  for  protection, 
not  for  revenue. 

Responsible  Republican  opinion,  prior  to  the 
canvass  of  1888,  has  been  in  accordance  with  the 
"pledges"  of  the  platforms  of  1868  and  1884  to 
reduce  tariff  taxation.  Whence  the  new  light? 
Some  of  these  opinions  are  interesting  reading  to- 
day. 

William  McKinley,  of  Ohio,  1882,  - 

The  free  list  imVht  be  enlarged  without  affecting  injuriously 
a  single  American  interest. 

Senator  Warner  Miller,  of  New  York,  1882,  — 

The  sooner  we  have  that  (tariff)  revision  the  better  it  will 
be  for  all  industries. 


226  NOTES. 

Senator  Hawley,  of  Connecticut,  1882,  — 

I  will  vote  in  any  direction  to  bring  about  a  resolute  attempt 
to  give  us  a  revision  of  the  tariff.  I  say  that  as  representing  a 
protectionist  constituency. 

Benjamin  Harrison,  Nov.  28,  1882,  — 

If  the  report  (of  the  tariff  commission  of  1882  recommend- 
ing a  reduction  of  duties)  conies  in,  it  should  be  promptly  acted 
upon.  My  opinion  is  that  no  time  should  be  lost  after  Congress 
assembles  in  bringing  forward  these  measures,  and  that  no  time 
should  be  lost  during  the  holidays  by  adjournment. 

James  G.  Elaine  on  Lumber — -June  10, 1868, — 

During  the  entire  war,  when  we  were  seeking  everything  on 
the  earth,  and  in  the  skies,  and  in  the  waters  under  the  earth, 
out  of  which  taxation  could  be  wrung,  it  never  entered  into 
the  conception  of  Congress  to  tax  breadstuffs  —  never.  During 
the  most  pressing  exigencies  of  the  terrible  contest  in  which  we 
were  engaged,  neither  breadstuffs  nor  lumber  ever  became  the 
subject  of  one  penny  of  taxation.  .  .  .  Now,  as  to  the  article  of 
lumber,  1  again  remind  the  House  that  there  has  never  been  a 
tax  upon  this  article.  The  gentleman  from  Ohio  may  talk  on 
this  question  as  he  pleases ;  but  I  say  that  wherever  the  West- 
ern frontiersman  undertakes  to  make  for  himself  a  home,  to 
till  the  soil,  to  carry  on  the  business  of  life,  he  needs  lumber 
for  his  cabin,  he  needs  lumber  for  his  fence,  he  needs  lumber 
for  his  wagon  or  cart,  he  needs  lumber  for  his  plough,  he 
needs  lumber  for  almost  every  purpose  in  his  daily  life. 

William  D.  Kelley,  of  Pennsylvania,  on  Free 
Wool  — July  28,1866,— 

Let  the  raw  material  come  in.  Let  us  make  blankets  that  will 
drive  out  English  blankets.  Let  us  make  our  own  * '  English 
frieze  "and  "Peterboro1  frosted  beaver."  Let  us  be  able  to 
rival  England  and  France  and  other  representative  nations  in 
making  these  cloths. 

Senator  Tngalls,  February  15,  1878,  — 

We  cannot  disguise  the  truth  that  we  are  on  the  verge  of  an 
impending  revolution;  the  old  issues  are  dead!  The  people 
are  arraying  themselves  upon  one  side  or  the  other  of  a  porten- 
tous contest.  On  one  side  is  capital,  formidably  entrenched  in 
privilege,  arrogant  from  continued  triumph,  conservative,  ten- 
acious to  old  theories,  demanding  new  concessions,  enriched  by 


NOTES.  227 

domestic  levy  and  foreign  commerce,  and  struggling  to  adjust 
all  values  to  its  own  standard.  On  the  other  is  labor,  asking 
for  employment,  striving  to  develop  domestic  industries, 
battling  with  the  forces  of  nature,  and  subduing  the  wilder- 
ness;  labor,  starving  and  sullen  in  cities ,  resolutely  determined 
to  overthrow  a  system  under  which  the  rich  are  growing  richer 
and  the  poor  are  growing  poorer ;  a  system  which  gives  to  a 
Vanderbilt  the  possession  of  wealth  beyond  the  dreams  of 
avarice  and  condemns  the  poor  to  a  poverty  which  has  no 
refuge  from  starvation  but  the  prison  or  the  grave. 

Charles  J.  Folger,  Secretary  of  the  Treasury, 
Annual  Report,  1882,  — 

All  agree  that  a  revision  of  the  tariff  is  necessary.  The 
action  of  Congress  in  creating  a  commission  for  that  purpose 
renders  discussion  on  that  point  unnecessary.  .  .  .  The  Secre- 
tary earnestly  recommends  a  careful  revision  of  the  tariff,  with 
a  view  to  substantial  reductions. 

Henry   Cabot   Lodge,  Massachusetts,   September, 

1884,  — 

Grave  public  questions  confront  us.  There  is  a  large,  peril- 
ous  and  growing  surplus  in  the  revenues.  It  must  be  removed, 
not  by  needless  and  extravagant  expenditures,  not  by  abolishing 
the  proper  taxation  of  whiskey  and  tobacco,  not  by  a  stupid 
and  injurious  and  horizontal  reduction  for  politics  only,  but  by 
plain  business  methods,  by  freeing  entirely  those  great  neces- 
saries of  life  which  enter 'into  the  daily  consumption  of  every 
household,  and  by  wise  and.  discriminate  reductions. 

John  D.  Long,  of  Massachusetts,  September, 
1884,— 

There  are  only  two  ways  to  reduce  the  tariff.  One,  by  rais- 
ing the  tariff  to  a  prohibitory  height,  which  nobody  advocates ; 
the  other,  the  free-list.  The  free-list  is  the  honest  revenue 
reformer's  hope. 

James  A.  Garfield,  March  10,  1871,— 

I  was  surprised  at  a  remark  of  the  distinguished  gentleman 
from  Michigan.  He  asserted  that  there  is  no  item  in  the  whole 
tariff  that  can  stand  alone  on  its  own  merits,  but  that  all  must 
be  taken  in  a  lump  in  order  to  stand.  That  coal  must  take  salt 
by  the  hand,  and  they,  too,  must  take  something  else  by  the 
hand ;  and  thus  all  interests  unite  with  all  forces  before  they 


228  NOTES. 

can  make  a  stand  before  the  country.  If  this  remark  be  true  it 
strikes  a  blow  at  the  whole  tariff  system,  a  blow  I  am  not  willing 
to  strike.  I  am  unwilling  to  admit  that  bad  taxes  must  be  tied 
to  good  ones  and  thus  be  kept  afloat.  I  think  it  unwise  to  con- 
tiiiue  this  duty  on  coal,  and  I  dm  therefore  in  favor  of  its  repeal. 

Mr.  Allison  in  Congress,  March  24,  1870, — 

I  will  say  with  regard  to  the  duty  on  wool  and  woollens,  that 
I  regard  it  not  as  an  intentional  fraud,  but  as  operating  as  though 
it  were  a  fraud  upon  the  great  body  of  the  people  of  the  United 
States.  I  allude  to  the  woollen  tariff,  a  law,  the  effect  of  which 
has  been  to  materially  injure  the  sheep  husbandry  of  this  cotmtry. 
In  a  single  county  in  the  state  of  Iowa,  between  1867  and  1869, 
the  number  of  sheep  was  reduced  from  22,000  to  about  18,000 
in  two  years,  and  what  is  true  of  this  county  is  true  to  a  greater 
or  less  extent  of  other  counties  in  Iowa,  and  during  this  time 
the  price  of  wool  has  been  constantly  depreciated. 

Mr.  Lawrence.  —  I  should  like  the  gentleman  to  inform  me 
how  a  reduction  of  the  duties  on  wool  and  woollen  goods 
would  enure  to  the  advantage  of  the  wool  grower? 

Mr.  Allison.  —  I  will  tell  the  gentleman  how,  in  my  judg- 
ment, the  wool  grower  will  be  benefited.  As  the  law  now  is, 
the  tariff  upon  fine  wools  of  a  character  not  produced  in  this 
country  is  100  per  cent  upon  their  cost.  The  tariff  upon  wool- 
lens of  the  same  class  is  only  about  50  per  cent,  so  that  the 
finer,  woollen  goods  are  imported,  and  not  the  coarser  fabrics. 
Before  the  tariff  of  1867  our  manufacturers  of  fine  goods  mixed 
foreign  fine  wools  with  our  domestic  product,  and  were  thus  able 
to  compete  successfully  with  the  foreign  manufacturer  of  similar 
wools.  But,  being  prohibited  from  importing  this  class  of  wools, 
these  fine  goods  cannot  now  be  produced  in  this  country  as 
cheaply  as  'they  can  be  imported.  Consequently,  mills  that  were 
formerly  engaged  in  producing  these  goods  have  been  compelled 
to  abandon  business  or  manufacture  the  coarser  fabrics.  If  they 
could  afford  to  manufacture  those  fine  goods,  they  would  make 
a  market  which  we  do  not  now  have,  for  our  fine  wools  to  be 
mixed  with  other  fine  wools  of  a  different  character  from 
abroad.  This  want  of  a  market,  as  I  understand  it,  is  the  reason 
why  our  fine  wools  now  command  so  low  a  price.  There  is  no 
demand  for  them  at  home,  and  we  cannot  export  them  in  com- 
petition with  fine  wools  grown  in  other  countries. 

In  1867,  John  Sherman  said,  — 

It  is,  therefore,  simply  an  absurdity  to  talk  now  about  free 
trade  tariff,  and  to  talk  about  a  protective  tariff  is  unnecessary, 
because  the  wit  of  man  could  not  possibly  frame  a  tariff  that 
would  produce  one  hundred  and  forty  million  dollars  in  gold 
without  amply  protecting  our  domestic  industry. 


NOTES.  229 

John  A.  Logan,  in  the  House,  April  18, 1870, — 

Now  when  the  gentleman,  who  seems  to  be  the  protector 
in  an  especial  manner  of  the  great  labor  interests  of  the 
country,  speaks  of  this  protection  being  the  protection  of 
the  labor  of  this  country,  I  ask  him :  does  not  every  farmer 
and  mechanic  in  this  broad  land  make  use  of  iron  in  all 
kinds  of  labor?  The  4,000,000  men  that  have  been  freed 
recently  are  laborers,  are  producers,  not  manufacturers. 
They  are  not  men  of  skilled  labor;  they  evidently  are  not 
the  men  who  are  protected.  And  then  there  are  the  men 
in  the  Northwest  who  produce  corn,  wheat,  oats,  pork  and 
beans,  etc. ;  they  are  producers  and  consumers,  and  are  not 
protected ;  and  it  is  they  who  pay  this  large  amount  of  money 
into  the  pockets  of  the  manufacturers  of  this  article.  And  when 
a  gentleman  stands  upon  this  floor  and  tells  me  that  this  high, 
this  extraordinary  high  tariff  is  for  the  protection  of  the  labor- 
ing men  of  this  country  who  are  not  skilled  laborers,  I  tell  him 
I  do  not  understand  how  he  can  possibly  substantiate  such  a 
theory. 

Henry  Wilson,  in  the  Senate,  1857,  — 

The  manufacturers,  Mr.  Chairman,  make  no  war  upon  the 
wool  growers.  They  assume  that  the  reduction  of  the  duty  on 
wool,  or  repeal  of  the  duty  altogether,  will  infuse  vigor  into 
that  drooping  interest,  stimulate  home  production  and  diminish 
the  importation  of  foreign  woollen  manufactures  and  afford  a 
steady  and  increasing  demand  for  American  wool.  They 
believe  this  policy  will  be  more  beneficial  to  the  wool  growers, 
to  the  agricultural  interests,  than  the  present  policy.  The 
manufacturers  of  woollen  fabrics,  many  of  them  men  of  large 
experience  and  extensive  knowledge,  entertain  these  views, 
and  they  are  sustained  in  these  opinions  by  the  experience  of 
the  great  manufacturing  nations  of  the  Old  World. 

Since  the  reductions  of  duties  on' raw  materials  in  England, 
since  wool  was  admitted  free,  her  woollen  manufactures  have 
so  increased,  so  prospered,  that  the  production  of  native  wool 
has  increased  more  than  100  per  cent.  The  experience  of 
England,  France,  and  Belgium  demonstrates  the  wisdom  of  that 
policy  which  makes  the  raw  material  duty-free.  Let  us  profit 
by  their  example.  If  our  manufactures  are  to  increase,  to  keep 
pace  with  the  population  and  the  growing  wants  of  our  peo- 
ple ;  if  we  are  to  have  the  control  of  the  markets  of  our  own 
country ;  if  we  are  to  meet  with  and  compete  with  the  manu- 
facturers of  England  and  other  nations  of  Western  Europe  in 
the  markets  of  the  world,  we  must  have  our  raw  materials 
admitted  duty-free,  or  at  a  more  nominal  rate.  We  of  New 


230  NOTES. 

England  believe  that  wool,  especially  the  cheap  wools,  manilla, 
hemp,  11  ax,  raw  silk,  lead,  tin,  brass,  hides,  linseed,  and  many 
other  articles  used  in  our  manufactories,  can  be  admitted  duty- 
free,  or  for  a  mere  nominal  duty,  without  injuring,  to  any 
extent,  any  considerable  interest  of  the  country. 

Horatio  C.  Bur  chard,  of  Illinois,  March  24,1870, — 

If  a  duty  averaging  nearly  100  per  cent  on  the  cost  of  the 
foreign  article  is  necessary  to  maintain  this  branch  of  industry 
(salt),  we  may  well  consider  if  it  were  not  better  to  abandon 
it. 

The  business  under  a  tariff  of  15  per  cent  from  1857  to  1861 
seems  to  have  been  flourishing.  Does  it  require  more  protec- 
tion as  the  business  becomes  established  ?  , 

But  the  chief  objection  to  the  duty  on  salt  is  that,  of  the  $3,- 
000,000  paid  for  revenue  and  protection,  the  greater  part  is 
paid  by  sections  of  the  country  and  industries  that  receive  no 
corresponding  benefits. 

The  chief  consumption  of  salt  is  by  those  engaged  in  fish- 
eries, and  in  raising  and  curing  beef  and  pork. 


III.     MR.  CLEVELAND'S  PENSION  RECORD. 

(Page  41.) 

Mr.  Cleveland's  record  as  to  pensions  is  sub- 
stantially as  follows, — 

He  approved  the  act  of  March  19,  1886,  which  has  increased 
to  $12  per  month  the  pensions  of  102,568  widows,  minors,  and 
dependent  relatives  of  Union  soldiers.  The  total  annual  in- 
crease in  money  granted  to  these  102,568  pensioners,  by  reason 
of  this  approval,  was  $4,923,964.. 

He  approved  the  act  of  August  4,  1886,  which  increased  the 
pensions  of  10,092  crippled  and  maimed  Union  soldiers  of  the 
late  war  from  $24  to  $30,  from  $30  to  $36,  and  $30  and  $37.50 
to  $45  per  month.  The  average  increase  in  these  cases  is 
estimated  at  $9  per  month,  or  $108  per  year,  and  the  total 
annual  increase  in  money  granted  to  these  10,092  pensioners, 
therefore,  $1,080,936.  He  approved  the  act  of  January  29, 
1SS7,  which  has  placed  on  the  pension  rolls  21,704  survivors 
and  widows  of  the  war  with  Mexico,  at  $8  per  month,  or  $96 
per  year.  The  annual  amount  in  money  which  these  21,701 
Mexican  pensioners  will  receive  is  $2,083,584. 

He  approved  the  act  of  June  7,  1888,  granting  arrears  of 
pensions  to  widows  from  the  date  of  their  husbands1  death,  in 


NOTES.  231 

all  cases  filed  subsequent  to  June  30,  1880.  The  approval  of 
the  act  of  June  7,  1888,  affects  some  10,000  widows  of  the  late 
war.  The  average  amount  of  money  which  these  10,000  will 
receive  is  $108  in  each  case,  making  a  total  of  $1,080,000. 

So  it  will  be  seen  that  Mr.  Cleveland  approved  general 
pension  acts  which  directly  and  pecuniarily  benefit  some 
164,344  ex-Union  and  Mexican  war  soldiers,  their  widows, 
orphans,  and  dependent  relatives. 

Mr.  Cleveland  approved  or  allowed  to  become  laws  by  lim- 
itation, over  1,351  private  acts  granting  pensions,  while  but 
1,524  private  pension  acts  were  approved,  or  allowed  to  become 
laws  by  limitation,  during  the  entire  twenty-four  years  that 
the  Republican  party  was  in  power.  He  approved,  or  allowed 
to  become  a  law  by  limitation,  nearly  or  quite  as  many  private 
pension  acts  as  all  of  the  Republican  presidents  from  Lincoln  to 
Arthur. 

THE   FIGURES. 

Number  of  private  pension  bills  approved  and  allowed  to 
become  laws  by  limitation  by  President  Grant  in  eight  years, 
485. 

Number  of  private  pension  bills  approved  and  allowed  to 
become  laws  by  limitation  by  President  Hayes  in  four  years, 
303. 

Number  of  private  pension  bills  approved  and  allowed  to 
become  laws  by  limitation  by  President  Arthur,  736. 

Number  of  private  pension  bills  approved  and  allowed  to 
become  laws  by  limitation  by  President  Cleveland  to  August 
14,  1888,  1351. 

Average  per  year  under  Grant,  60. 

Average  per  year  under  Hayes,  75. 

Average  per  year  under  Arthur,  184. 

Average  per  year  under  Cleveland,  360. 


IV.    TRUSTS. 

(Page  59.) 

The  following  are  the  trusts  at  present  extant: 
sugar  trust,  salt  trust,  earthenware  trust,  Bessemer 
steel  trust,  plough  steel  trust,  general  steel  trust, 
nail  trust,  general  iron  trust,  copper  trust,  zinc  trust, 
tin  trust,  lead  trust,  glass  trust,  soap  trust,  linseed- 
oil  trust,  rubber-shoe  trust,  envelope  trust,  paper-bag 


232 


NOTES. 


trust,  cordage  trust.  Here  are  nineteen  trusts  in  all, 
ten  being  on  metals.  Trusts  may  indeed  exist  in  a 
free-trade  country  as  they  do  in  England.  But  the 
best  opinion  seems  to  be  that  only  under  a  high  pro- 
tective tariff  can  a  trust  succeed  and  last. 

Besides  the  difficulty  of  controlling  the  foreign 
producer  of  a  trust  commodity,  whom  a  "protective" 
tariff  excludes,  under  free  trade  conditions,  it  has 
been  found  extremely  difficult  under  these  same  con- 
ditions to  control  the  stimulated  competition  which 
enhanced  "trust"  prices  naturally  produce. 


NAME  or  TRUST. 

Protected  by 
duties,  averaging, 
per  cent. 

Adjusted  to 
guarantee  a  bonus  in 
each  $100  of  product 
amounting  to 

Their  whole 
expense  for  labor 
in  $100  worth  of 
product  being 

Salt  trust     .     .     . 

50 

$33 

$25 

Earthenware  trust 

56 

36 

40 

Bessemer  steel  trust 

84 

46 

9 

Plough-steel  trust 

45 

33 

29 

General  steel  trust 

45 

33 

29 

Nail  trust     . 

45 

33 

22 

General  iron  trust 

45 

33 

25 

Copper  trust 

24 

22 

22 

Zinc  trust    . 

52 

28 

25 

Tin  trust 

32 

24 

21 

Lead  trust    . 

74 

.43 

65 

Glass  trust  . 

55 

36 

45 

Soap  trust    . 

26 

19 

8 

Linseed  oil  trust  . 

54 

35 

5 

Rubber  shoe  trust 

25 

20 

24     ' 

Envelope  trust 

25 

20 

11 

Paper  bag  trust     . 

35 

26 

15 

Cordage  trust  .    . 

25 

20 

12 

Average      •    .    . 

30 

$24 

NOTES.  233 

V.     FREE   WOOL. 

(Page  72.) 

In  1885  the  National  Association  of  Wool  Manu- 
facturers made  a  statement  to  Daniel  Manning,  then 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  in  which  the  argument 
for  untaxed  raw  material  was  thus  stated,  — 

The  American  manufacturer  is  engaged  in  a  perpetual 
struggle  with  the  manufacturers  of  Europe  for  the  possession 
of  the  markets  of  this  country.  In  this  strife  the  European 
manufacturer  possesses  the  advantage,  which  would  be  over- 
whelming, if  not  counteracted  by  special  legislation,  of  having 
the  raw  material  of  his  manufacture  free  from  duty —  no 
duties  on  wool  existing  in  Great  Britain,  France,  Belgium,  the 
Netherlands,  and  very  slight  duties,  if  any,  in  olher  manufac- 
turing nations.  Our  European  competitors  are  exempt  from 
the  direct  enhancement,  by  a  duty,  of  the  cost  of  wool,  thus 
requiring  less  capital  to  supply  their  mills,  and  no  cost  of 
interest  on  fhe  duty  required  in  carrying  their  stocks  of  wool 
and  goods.-  They  are  free  from  the  apprehension  of  changes 
in  the  value  of  wool,  such  as  have  taken  place  in  this  country 
in  consequence  of  no  less  than  seventeen  changes  in  the  tariff 
on  wools  within  the  memory  of  living  manufacturers.  They 
are  exempt  from  the  duties  on  wool  substitutes,  so  usefully 
employed  to  mix  with  wool  in  the  manufacture  of  the  cheaper 
and  heavier  cloths,  —  duties  which  with  us  are  absolutely  pro- 
hibitory. They  are  able,  from  the  lower  cost  of  their  raw 
material,  to  relieve  themselves,  from  over-production  by  con- 
signing their  surplus  stocks,  at  comparatively  slight  sacrifice, 
to  foreign  markets,  to  which  their  cheapness  has  already 
introduced  them.  They  are  not  compelled,  as  we  are,  to  dis- 
criminate in  their  choice  of  wool  to  avoid  the  effect  of  the  duty, 
and  are  able  to  select  their  wools  in  any  condition,  whether 
unwashed,  washed,  or  scoured,  with  reference  only  to  their 
desirable  qualities.  Through  freedom  of  importation  they 
have  near  markets, —  as  at  London,  Havre,  Antwerp,  and 
Berlin  —  offering  vast  assortments  and  a  steady  supply  of  all 
kinds  of  wool,  —  advantages  specially  favorable  to  the  small 
manufacturer.  This  exemption  from  all  restrictions  in  the 
selection  of  raw  material,  together  with  the  facilities  for 
supply,  and  the  certainty  that  values  will  not  be  disturbed  by 
legislation,  is  believed  to  be  the  chief  cause  of  a  characteristic 
of  the  European  woollen  industry —  namely,  that  the  manufac- 
turer abroad  obtains  success  by  adhering  with  steady  attention 
to  the  special  fabrics  he  has  undertaken  to  make,  and  in  which 


234  NOTES. 

he  has  acquired  excellence,  while  diversification  of  manufac- 
tures, so  necessary  to  prevent  overproduction,  is  encouraged 
by  the  equal  availibility  of  all  varieties  and  conditions  of  raw 
material. 

The  petition  of  the  workers  in  textile  industries 
of  Philadelphia  presented  in  Congress  June  29, 1888, 
is  to  the  same  effect, — 

According  to  Bowes  &  Co.,  an  accepted  authority,  100 
pounds  of  greasy  wool  will  make  21.45  pounds  of  finished 
cloth,  and  on  this  basis  it  will  require  530  pounds  .of  greasy 
wool  to  make  100  yards  of  cloth  with  backing,  weighing  18 
ounces  to  the  yard.  Suppose  this  cloth  is  made  of  four  dif- 
ferent kinds  of  wool,  the  cost  to  the  English  manufacturer 
would  be,  — 

150  pounds  of  fourth  quality,  at  12  cents  .  .  $18.00 

130  pounds  of  third  quality,  at  24  cents  .  .  .     31.20 

125  pounds  of  second  quality,  at  26  cents  .  .     32.50 

125  pounds  of  first  quality,  at  33  cents    .  .  .     41.25 

Total  cost  of  wool $122.95 

With  precisely  the  same  grades  of  wool  the  cost  to  the 
American  manufacturer  would  be,  — 

150  pounds  of  fourth  quality,  at  23.94  cents  .  $35.91 

130  pounds  of  third  quality,  at  37.54  cents  .  .  48.80 

125  pounds  of  second  quality,  at  39.64  cents  .  49.55 

125  pounds  of  first  quality,  at  49.61  cents    .  .  62.01 


Total  cost  of  wool $196.27 

Excess  of  cost  to  the  American  manufacturer      73.32 

The  total  cost  for  labor  in  making  this  cloth  is  not  over  27 
cents  per  yard,  or  $27  for  the  whole,  showing  that  the  tariff- 
enhanced  cost  of  the  material  is  nearly  three  times  the  entire 
expense  for  labor. 

The  importations  of  woollen  and  worsted  yarns  for  the  years 
1886-87  were  7,039,448  pounds,  valued  at  $4,030,738,  on 
which  duties  were  paid  amounting  to  $2,777,582.  The 
amount  of  wool  required  to  make  this  yarn  is  28,157,792 
pounds.  The  duty  on  the  wool  would  be  $2,815,779,  and 
adding  the  charges  for  carrying  the  duty  we  have  a  total  tax 
burden  on  the  wool  of  $3,097,356,  or  $319,776  in  excess  of  the 
duty  on  the  yarn.  The  total  cost  for  labor  in  making  this  yarn 
is  not  over  $700,000,  showing  that  the  tax  on  the  wool  is 
nearly  four  and  a  half  times  the  total  labor  cost  in  the  yarn. 
This,  on  the  theory  advanced  by  the  modern  protection  school, 


NOTES.  235 

can  be  called  by  no  other  name  than  protection  to  foreign 
manufacturers  and  labor. 

The  per  cent  of  duty  on  the  yarn  is  69.11,  and  on  the  cloth 
70.40,  a  difference  of  but  1.29  per  cent;  but  as  there  is  a  loss 
by  waste  and  shrinkage  in  weaving,  dyeing,  and  finishing,  of 
3  to  5  per  cent,  we  find  that  this  difference  between  the  yarn 
duty  and  that  on  the  cloth  is  more  than  neutralized,  and  thus 
the  *  *  protective  "  duty  is  again  in  favor  of  the  foreign  cloth 
manufacturers,  who  could  not  have  done  better  for  themselves 
if  they  had  been  permitted  to  make  our  tariff  laws  for  us. 

Under  the  present  law,  the  percentage  of  duty  on  the  finer 
and  more  costly  fabrics  is  always  lower  than  on  the  coarser 
and  cheaper  grades,  thus  depriving  us  of  the  chance  to  work 
upon  the  better  class  of  goods,  upon  which  our  work  would  be 
lightest  and  our  earnings  largest. 

The  importation  of  woollen  and  worsted  cloths  for  the  year 
ended  June  30,  1887,  was,  of  the  value  not  exceeding  80  cents 
per  pound,  1,117,564  pounds,  valued  at  $713,315,  on  which 
duties  were  paid  amounting  to  $640,808.  Per  cent  of  duty, 
89.84.  Value  above  80  cents  per  pound,  7,689,699  pounds, 
valued  at  $9,309,054,  on  which  duties  were  paid  to  the  amount 
of  $6,415,016.  Per  cent  of  duty,  68.91. 

This  shows  how  we  are  crippled  both  in  our  earning 
powers  and  in  the  exercise  of  our  skill,  by  the  infamous  dis- 
criminations of  the  tariff,  which  at  the  same  time  make  the 
burdens  upon  the  rich  comparatively  lighter  than  upon  the 
poor. 

VI.     IRON  AND  STEEL. 

(Page  75.) 

Under  no  possible  condition  of  the  world's  trade, 
could  the  United  States  be  "inundated"  by  foreign 
iron  and  steel,  if  not  one  dollar  of  the  present  tariff 
tax  was  levied  on  them.  Iron,  as  everybody  may 
know,  lies  at  the  base  of  civilization  on  the  side  of 
its  industries,  so  that  the  degree  in  civilization  of 
any  nation  may  be  gauged  by  the  amount  of  the 
iron  and  steel  which  it  consumes.  From  the  data 
already  given,  it  appears  that  the  annual  consump- 
tion of  steel  and  iron  in  the  United  States,  from  1878 
to  1887  inclusive,  was  about  6,000,000  tons,  or  a 
little  less  than  30  per  cent  of  the  entire  production 
of  the  world.  In  that  period,  then,  the  consumption 


236  NOTES. 

of  iron  and  steel  in  the  United  States  was  75  per 
cent  of  all  that  Great  Britain  produced,  and  in  1889 
nearly  equalled  the  entire  annual  output  of  Great 
Britain.  Jf,  then,  Great  Britain  could  "inundate" 
this  country  with  all  the  iron  and  steel  we  use,  she 
would  not  have  one  ton  left  at  home.  But  Great 
Britain  has  a  few  manufactures  of  her  own,  and 
needs  just  a  little  iron  and  steel  for  her  houses, 
bridges,  machineries,  steamships,  railroads,  etc.,  as 
well  as  for  colonies  like  Australia,  and  a  trifle,  at 
least,  for  some  of  her  European  neighbors.  As  a 
fact,  Great  Britain  uses  most  of  her  output  of  iron 
and  steel  in  her  own  industries.  Furthermore,  as 
every  other  country,  with  the  possible  exception  of 
Belgium,  Sweden,  and  Norway,  imports  more  iron 
and  steel  than  it  exports,  where  in  the  world,  under 
any  circumstances,  can  the  United  States  get  most 
of  its  iron  and  steel  except  out  of  its  own  mines  and 
furnaces  ? 

But  it  may  be  said  if  iron  and  steel  are  made 
free,  Great  Britain  will  set  more  men  to  work  in 
her  mines  and  furnaces  and  pour  a  whole  ocean  of 
iron  and  steel  upon  our  devoted  heads  in  an  "inun- 
dation," which  would  drown  out  all  our  own  mines 
and  furnaces.  This  is  certainly  a  sad  picture  to 
look  on,  and  so  we  may  as  well  look  on  another 
picture,  painted  out  of  the  actual  facts.  Great 
Britain  imported  in  1887  nearly  4,000,000  tons  of 
iron  ore  from  Spain,  Elba,  and  Africa,  every  ton  of 
which  came  in  free  of  duty.  In  1888,  the  United 
States  imported  nearly  2,000,000  tons,  and  paid  a 
duty  on  the  same  of  38  per  cent.  The  fact  is,  that 
the  English  mines  of  the  better  iron  ores  have  been 
worked  so  long  and  so  energetically  that,  while  not 
given  out  entirely,  they  are  growing  every  year  more 
difficult  to  work,  and  their  output  consequently 
more  expensive.  For  this  reason,  the  advantage 
which  Great  Britain  once  had  in  mining,  even  over 
countries  like  Belgium  and  Germany,  long  rr;'ice 


NOTES.  237 

passed  away.  As  to  the  protection  "  spook "  of 
pauper  labor  creating  goods  so  cheaply  as  to  defy 
our  competing  with  European  manufacturers,  it  has 
been  disproved  a  thousand  times  before  to-day,  and 
can  be  disproved  by  the  facts  ten  thousand  times 
to-morrow  in  all  shops  and  in  all  markets.  Yet  it 
may  not  be  amiss  to  say  that  in  the  production  of 
coke,  which  enters  largely  into  the  cost  of  the  manu- 
facture of  iron  and  steel,,  while  the  cost  per  ton  in 
different  parts  of  England  ranges  from  $1.70  to  $3.57, 
and  is  $2.57  in  Belgium,  the  price  in  the  United 
States  at  the  oven  is  $1.22. 

Thus,  while  the  English  iron  mines  are  on  the 
wane,  and  their  owners  must  necessarily  look  for- 
ward towards  the  end,  near  or  far  off,  as  the  case 
may  be,  the  American  iron  and  coal  mines  grow 
yearly  in  number  and  value  to  an  extent  which  the 
world  has  never  before  seen.  The  mine-owners  of 
Alabama,  for  instance,  where  coal  and  iron  ore  lie 
almost  side  by  side,  can  manufacture  iron  and  steel 
at  a  less  cost  than  is  possible  elsewhere  on  the  globe 
—  even  including  Pennsylvania.  Very  much  the 
same  state  of  things  undoubtedly  exists  in  certain 
parts  of  Tennessee  and  North  Carolina.  When  the 
ample  capital  which  has  been  attracted  there  com- 
pletes its  plant,  and  begins  to  send  its  iron  and 
steel  over  the  railroads  now  building  or  built,  it  is 
perfectly  safe  to  say  that  the  new  mills  will  either 
hopelessly  glut  our  home  market  in  the  first  six 
months,  or  must  find  an  open  way  into  the  markets 
of  the  world.  If  they  gain  possession,  or  even  a  fair 
foothold  in  those  markets,  the  danger  of  those  mar- 
kets "  inundating"  us  with  iron  and  steel  is  evi- 
dently infinitesimally  small.  If  they  do  not  find 
that  market,  they  will  "  inundate  "  the  Pennsylvania 
mines  with  cheap  iron,  unless  the  two  sections  form 
a  trust  and  limit  the  output,  or  unless  Pennsylvania 
can  persuade  Congress,  by  some  indirect  avoidance  of 
the  Constitution,  to  "protect"  her  from  the  " paup  , ''' 


238  NOTES. 

iron  of  the  Southern  States.  From  this  point  of  view 
it  would  seem  to  follow  that  the  State  which  is  most 
interested  to  have  iron  and  steel  free  is  Pennsyl- 
vania herself;  since  in  a  struggle  with  Alabama  for 
the  home  market  she  would  undoubtedly  come  off 
second  best,  and  in  case  of  a  glutted  home  market  it 
would  be  the  South  which  could  sell  at  a  profit  the 
iron  and  steel  which  cost  her  less  to  produce  than 
Pennsylvania.  The  next  interest  which,  as  the  facts 
are,  is  most  concerned  to  have  free  iron  is  the  new 
iron  industry  of  the  South,  since,  while  it  will  soon 
come  to  have  no  dangerous  competition  at  home,  and 
has  only  to  dread  a  glutted  home  market,  it  needs 
and  must  have  a  free  and  open  road  into  the  markets 
of  the  world.  Of  course  the  millions  who  consume 
iron  goods  have  a  standing  interest  of  the  largest 
kind  in  having  iron  free,  —  and  thereby  getting  iron 
goods  reduced  in  price.  The  farmers'  and  manufac- 
turers' machinery,  the  sailors'  iron  ships,  have,  of 
course,  the  same  interest. 

It  may  indeed  be  said  that  free  iron  and  steel 
would  be  fatal  to  other  mines  and  manufactories 
than  those  of  Pennsylvania  and  Alabama.  Only  to 
those  which  are  misplaced  as  regards  transportation 
or  their  raw  material,  or  with  effete  machinery  — 
or,  in  other  words,  only  to  those  unwise,  and,  so  to 
speak,  impossible  iron  industries  which  were,  from 
the  start,  business  mistakes.  And  these  must  perish, 
anyhow,  under  a  tariff  or  no  tariff,  and  their  fate  is 
hastened  by  the  newly  discovered  cheapness  of  the 
Southern  iron  mines.  Business  mistakes  have  cer- 
tainly no  claim  to  dominate  the  financial  policy  of 
the  country  in  the  fundamental  iron  industry. 

On  the  other  hand,  with  iron  and  coal  free,  our 
American  manufacturers  of  iron  and  steel  would  in 
less  than  five  years  dominate  the  markets  of  the 
world.  In  that  case,  the  insurance  of  our  own  iron 
and  steel  masters  against  foreign  competition  in  our 
home  market  would  be  complete. 


NOTES.  239 

VII.     PRIVATE    TAXATION    IS    ILLEGAL 
TAXATION. 

(Page  82.) 

Further  extracts  from  the  opinion  in  the  "  Topeka 
Case  "  show  even  more  clearly  the  reasoning  of  the 
Court,  that  private  taxation  is  illegal  taxation, — 

It  must  be  conceded  that  there  are  such  rights  [as  that  to 
insist  that  taxation  should  be  for  a  public  object]  in  every  free 
government  beyond  the  control  of  the  state.  A  government 
which  recognized  no  such  rights,  which  held  the  lives,  the 
liberty,  and  the  prosperity  of  its  citizens  subject,  at  all  times,  to 
the  absolute  disposition  and  unlimited  control  of  even  the 
most  democratic  depositary ^of  power,  is,  after  all,  but  a  des- 
potism. It  is  true  it  is  a  despotism  of  the  many,  of  the 
majority,  if  you  choose  to  call  it  so,  but  it  is  none  the  less  a 
despotism.  It  may  well  be  doubted,  if  a  man  is  to  hold  all  that 
he  is  accustomed  to  call  his  own,  all  in  which  he  has  placed  his 
happiness,  and  the  security  of  which  is  essential  to  that  happi- 
ness, under  the  unlimited  dominion  of  others,  whether  it  is  not 
wiser  that  this  power  should  be  exercised  by  one  man  than  by 
many.  .  .  .  The  power  to  tax  is,  therefore,  the  strongest,  the 
most  pervading  of  all  the  powers  of  government,  reaching 
directly  or  indirectly  to  all  classes  of  the  people.  It  was  said 
by  Chief  Justice  Marshall,  in  the  case  of  McCulloch  vs.  The 
State  of  Maryland  (4  Wheaton,  431),  that  the  power  to  tax  is 
the  power  to  destroy.  A  striking  instance  of  the  truth  of  the 
proposition  is  seen  in  the  fact  that  the  existing  tax  of  10  per 
cent  imposed  by  the  United  States  on  the  circulation  of  all 
other  banks  than  the  National  Banks  drove  out  of  existence 
every  State  bank  of  circulation  within  a  year  or  two  after  its 
passage.  This  power  can  as  readily  be  employed  against  one 
class  of  individuals  and  in  favor  of  another,  so  as  to  ruin  the 
one  class  and  give  unlimited  wealth  and  prosperity  to  the 
other,  if  there  is  no  implied  limitation  of  the  uses  for  which 
the  power  may  be  exercised.  .  .  .  But,  in  the  case  before  us, 
in  which  the  towns  are  authorized  to  contribute  aid  by  way  of 
taxation  to  any  class  of  manufactures,  there  is  no  difficulty  in 
holding  that  this  is  not  such  a  public  purpose  as  we  have  been 
considering.  If  it  be  said  that  a  benefit  results  to  the  local  pub- 
lic of  a  town  by  establishing  manufactures,  the  same  may  be 
said  of  any  other  business  or  pursuit  which  employs  capital 
or  laboi.  The  merchant,  the  mechanic,  the  innkeeper,  the 
banker,  the  builder,  the  steamboat  owner.,  are  equally  pro- 
moters of  the  public  good,  and  equally  ddsyrving  the  aid  of  the 


240  NOTES. 

citizens  by  forced  contributions.  No  line  can  be  drawn  in 
favor  of  the  manufacturer  which  would  not  open  the  coffers  of 
the  public  treasury  to  the  importunities  of  two-thirds  of  the 
business  men  of  the  city  or  town. 

The  opinion  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United 
States  that  taxation  for  a  private  purpose  is  uncon- 
stitutional, though  there  is  an  incidental  public  gain, 
is  .the  general  law  of  the  country. 

Thus,  in  Maine,  in  the  case  of  Allen  vs.  The  Inhabit- 
ants of  Jay  (60  Maine,  124),  it  was  held  that  a  town 
had  no  authority  to  raise  money  by  taxation  to  loan  to 
a  firm  of  individuals  on  their  investing  $12,000  in  a 
steam  saw  mill,  grist  mill  and  box  factory  machinery, 
to  be  built  in  the  town,  even  though  the  loan  was  to  be 
secured  by  a  mortgage  on  the  mill,  and  a  special  act  of 
the  Maine  legislature  had  ratified  the  vote  of  the  town. 

"Ultimately,"  the  Court  say,  "it  will  be  found  that  the 
question  resolves  itself  into  an  inquiry,  whether  the  legis- 
lature can  constitutionally  authorize  the  majority  of  a  town  to 
loan  their  o\vn  and  the  money  of  a  minority  raised  by  taxation 
and  against  the  will  of  "Such  minority,  as  such  majority  may 
determine.  ...  If  there  is  any  proposition  about  which  there 
is  an  entire  and  uniform  weight  of  judicial  authority,  it  is  that 
taxes  are  to  be  imposed  for  the  use  of  the  people  of  the  State  in 
the  varied  and  manifold  purposes  of  government,  and  not  for 
private  objects  or  the  special  benefit  of  individuals.  .  .  .  The 
acquisition,  possession,  and  protection  of  property  are  among 
the  chief  ends  of  government.  To  take  directly  or  indirectly 
thejDroperty  of  individuals  to  loan  to  others  for  purposes  of 
private  gain  and  speculation,  against  the  consent  of  those 
whose  money  is  thus  loaned,  would  be  to  withdraw  it  from 
the  protection  of  the  constitution  and  submit  it  to  the  will  of 
an  irresponsible  majority.  It  would  be  the  robbery  and  spolia- 
tion of  those  whose  estates,  in  whole  or  in  part,  are  thus  con- 
fiscated. No  surer  or  more  effectual  method  could  be  devised 
to  deter  from  accumulation,  to  diminish  capital,  to  render 
property  insecure,  and  thus  to  paralyze  industry." 

So  the  Supreme  Court  of  Wisconsin,  in  the  case  of 
Whiting  vs.  Fond  du  Lac  Railroad  (25  Wise.  167, 
188),  held  that  a  statute  authorizing  the  supervisors 
of  a  county  (after  an  affirmative  vote  of  the  people  of 
the  county)  to  raise  money  by  taxation  and  give  it 


NOTES.  241 

to  a  railroad  was  invalid  as  an  illegal  exercise  of  the 
taxing  power.     The  Court  say,  — 

It  is  obvious  if  public  benefits  and  advantages  of  this  kind 
(the  benefit  to  the  public  of  having  a  railroad),  and  which  may 
be  properly  called  incidental,  constitute  a  public  use  which  will 
justify  a  resort  to  either  of  these  sovereign  powers  of  govern- 
ment (eminent  domain  or  taxation),  that  then  all  distinction 
between  public  and  private  business,  and  public  and  private 
purposes,  is  obliterated,  and  the  door  to  taxation  is  opened  wide 
for  every  conceivable  object  by  which  the  public  interest  may 
be  directly  or  in  any  wise  promoted.  Such  a  doctrine  would 
be  subversive  to  all  just  ideas  of  the  powers  of  government, 
and  destructive  of  all  rights  of  private  property,  leaving  ' 
every  man's  estate  to  be  held  by  him  as  a  mere  grace  or  favor 
received  at  the  hands  of  the  legislative  body. 

So  in  Lowell  vs.  City  of  Boston  (111  Mass.  454), 
the  Supreme  Judicial  Court  of  Massachusetts  held 
that  a  statute  authorizing  the  City  of  Boston  to  raise, 
by  taxation,  a  sum  not  exceeding  $20,000,000,  to  be 
loaned  on  mortgage  to  the  owners  of  land  in  that  city, 
whose  buildings  had  been  burned  by  the  great  fire  of 
1872,  was  void.  The  legislature  of  Massachusetts  had 
been  called  together  by  the  governor  in  extra  session 
for  the  purpose  of  affording  relief  to  the  city  in  its 
great  calamity.  But  the  Court  held  the  tax  was  un- 
constitutional as  being  levied  for  other  than  a  public 
purpose,  — 

The  promotion  of  the  interests  of  individuals,  either  in  respect 
of  property  or  business,  although  it  may  result  incidentally  in 
the  advancement  of  the  public  welfare,  is,  in  its  essential  char- 
acter, a  private  and  not  a  public  object.  However  certain  and 
great  the  resulting  good  to  the  general  public,  it  does  not  by 
reason  of  its  comparative  importance  cease  to  be  incidental. 
The  incidental  advantage  to  the  public,  or  to  the  State,  which 
results  from  the  promotion  of  private  interests,  and  the  pros- 
perity of  private  enterprises  or  business,  does  not  justify  their 
aid  by  the  use  of  public  money  raised  by  taxation,  or  for  which 
taxation  may  become  necessary.  It  is  the  essential  character 
of  the  direct  object  of  the  expenditure  which  must  determine 
its  validity  as  justifying  a  tax,  and  not  the  magnitude  of  the 
interests  to  be  affected,  nor  the  degree  to  which  the  general 
advantage  of  the  community,  and  thus  the  public  welfare,  may 
be  ultimately  benefited  by  their  promotion. 


242  NOTES. 

Judge  Thomas  M.  Cooley,  of  Michigan,  in  "  Con- 
stitutional Limitations,"  — 

Constitutionally  a  tax  can  have  no  other  basis  than  the  rais- 
ing of  revenues  for  public  purposes,  and  whatever  govern- 
mental exaction  has  not  this  basis  is  tyrannical  and  unlawful. 
A  tax  on  imports,  therefore,  the  purpose  of  which  is  not  to  raise 
revenue,  but  to  discourage  and  indirectly  prohibit  some  partic- 
ular import  for  the  benefit  of  some  home  manufacturer,  may 
well  be  questioned  as  being  merely  colorable,  and,  therefore, 
not  warranted  by  constitutional  principles. 


VIII.     DELVING   INTO    DEBT. 

(Page  98.) 

The  simple  fact  is  that  a  high  protective  tariff  wall  against 
imports,  as  contrasted  with  free  trade  in  its  workings,  is  as  if 
villages  in  the  rainless  delta  of  the  Nile  were  to  wall  out  the 
annual  flood,  with  its  fertilizing  mud  from  Abyssinia,  and 
then  set  to  work  to  manufacture  manures  and  distil  water. 
(There  would  be  plenty  of  work  for  somebody  thereabouts.) 
On  the  other  hand,  suppose  that  one  village  in  a  free  trade 
temper,  which  is  always  willing  to  let  any  good  gift  of  God 
come  into  the  lap  of  "His  busy  and  hard-working  children, 
cleared  away  all  obstructions  and  let  the  Nile  come  in  all  it 
would  or  could.  What  would  happen  if  both  kept  on  this 
way?  The  village  with  its  free  Nile  would  have  such  big 
crops  at  such  a  cheap  cost  that  it  would  undersell  its  neighbors 
in  all  neutral  markets,  and  in  their  own  too,  if  the  tariff  was 
not  too  high,  and  with  its  surplus  turn  round  and  buy  what- 
ever it  wanted  from  its  neighbors,  desolated  by  scarcity  and 
high  prices,  consequent  on  their  "protecting"  themselves 
against  a  gift  of  nature  which  they  drove  away,  and  which 
their  neighbors  accepted  with  thanks.  —  BADEN  POWELL'S 
State  Aid  and  State  Interference.  Pp.  229-30. 

IX.     PINEAPPLES  AND   PORTER. 

(Page  99.) 

Take  a  supposed  case  in  illustration.  Pineapples  can  be 
grown  in  England  for  2s.  6d.  each;  equally  good  pineapples 
can  be  sent  from  Jamaica  at  a  cost  of  6d.  each,  including  2d. 
profit  to  the  grower.  So  Jamaica  exports  great  quantities 
of  pineapples  into  England.  But  porter  cannot  be  made  in 
Jamaica,  so  warm  is  the  climate,  at  less  cost  than  2s.  Cd  a  bottle. 


NOTES.  243 

It  can  be  made  in  England  at  6d.  a  bottle,  including  2d. 
profit  to  the  brewer.  The  cost  of  carriage  to  and  fro  is  the 
same  for  a  bottle  or  a  pineapple.  We  send  to  Jamaica,  say, 
1000  bottles  of  porter,  costing  £25.  We  receive  from  Jamaica 
1000  pineapples  costing  £25.  The  brewer  in  England,  by 
having  a  market  in  Jamaica,  has  made  £8  profit ;  and  so,  too, 
the  pineapple  grower  in  Jamaica,  by  having  a  market  in  Eng- 
land, has  made  £8  profit.  Both  parties  have  gained  by  the 
exchange.  But  the  public,  the  consumers  in  both  England  and 
Jamaica,  have  gained  vastly  more.  But  now  suppose  a  tariff 
prohibited  pineapples  from  entering  England  and  porter  from 
entering  Jamaica.  Then  the  porter  drinkers  would  have  to 
pay  £125  instead  of  £25  for  the  thousand  bottles,  and  the 
eaters  of  pineapples  would  have  to  pay  £125  instead  of  £25 
for  every  1000  pineapples,  or,  in  other  words,  Jamaica  would 
have  been  impoverished  £100  and  England  £100  on  every 
such  transaction. 

Why  not  let  both  the  porter  and  the  pineapples  go  scot- 
free? —  POWELL'S  State  Aid  and  State  Interference.  Pp. 
227-28. 

X.     MACHINERY. 

(Page  110.) 

So  far  as  this  nation  goes  at  present,  our  machin- 
ery is  knocking  against  the  tariff  wall  to  get  oat; 
foreign  machinery  is  knocking  to  get  in.  But 
machinery  is  only  the  inevitable  evolution  of  civiliza- 
tion. As  our  tariff  is  therefore  assailed  on  both 
sides  by  civilization  itself,  it  is  only  a  question  of 
time  as  to  its  being  broken  through.  In  the  clash 
of  machinery  between  our  market  and  the  foreign 
market,  all  the  facts  show  that  the  United  States 
would  come  out  on  top. 

A  few  facts  as  to  machinery  as  evolved  by  civiliza- 
tion. That  the  first  effect  of  improved  machinery  is 
to  bring  temporary  distress  to  many  persons,  cannot 
be  denied.  The  history  of  manufactures  all  over  the 
world  proves  it.  That  the  final  result  is  to  bring 
comfort  and  prosperit}^  to  the  mechanic,  is  equally 
true  and  proved  by  the  same  authority.  Thus  when 
Arkwright  invented  his  cotton-spinning  machine  in 
1760  there  were  5,200  spinners  on  the  spinning-wheel, 


244  NOTES. 

and  2,700  weavers  —  total,  7.900  — in  Great  Britain. 
Many  of  these  were  thrown  out  of  work  and  there 
was  much  distress.  Mobs  destroyed  the  machines 
And  had  to  be  put  down  by  force.  But  in  1787  — 
twenty-seven  years  after  the  invention  —  Parliament 
found  on  inquiry  that  the  number  of  those  engaged 
in  the  spinning  and  weaving  business  had  risen  to 
820,000  —  an  increase  of  4,400  per  cent ;  while  in 
1888  the  number  was  at  least  2,500,000.  The  same 
statistics  and  results  are  shown  in  France  and  Ger- 
many ;  indeed,  in  all  civilized  countries.  Machines 
are  a  blessing  to  wages  and  labor. 

More  people  are  probably  now  employed  and  well 
paid  in  industries  based  upon  new  inventions  and 
utilizing  old  forces  of  Nature  than  were  employed 
altogether  in  civilized  Europe  and  America  a  hun- 
dred years  ago  —  farm  machines;  the  telegraph; 
ocean  and  land  photography;  the  electrotype;  the 
steam  excavator  and  steam  drill  ;  the  sewing- 
machine ;  the  electric  light;  the  steam  fire-engine; 
the  telephone  ;  all  the  new  ways  of  refining  sugar ; 
steamships,  railroads,  and  a  host  of  others.  There 
is  even  an  improvement  on  the  old-fashioned  mill- 
stone, by  the  substitution  of  steel  rollers,  where,  by 
the  new  system  of  grinding  grain,  74  per  cent  of 
the  wheat  goes  into  flour,  leaving  26  per  cen't  in 
offal  and  bran,  as  against  33-J-  per  cent  left  by  the  old 
system.  In  the  manufacture  of  agricultural  imple- 
ments, 600  hands  do  the  work  that  formerly  required 
2,145  ;  in  boots  and  shoes,  one  man  does  the  work  of 
five,  arid  supplies  enough  shoes  to  furnish  1,000 
men ;  in  the  carpet  manufacture  one  man  does  the 
work  that  once  required  from  10  to  20;  in  spinning, 
the  work  of  from  75  to  100  men.  In  the  manufac- 
ture of  paper  a  new  machine  for  drying  and  cutting, 
run  by  4  men  and  6  women,  will  do  the  work  of 
100  persons  ;  so  also  in  wall  paper.  The  mechanical 
industries  of  the  United  States  carried  on  by  steam 
and  water  represent  the  labor  of  21,000,000  men. 


NOTES.  245 

Our  railroads,  with  250,000  men,  now  do  the  work 
which,  forty  years  ago,  would  have  required 
13,500,000  men  and  54,000,000  horses.  To  do 
the  work  forty  years  ago  in  factories  and  on  rail- 
roads which  we  do  to-day  would  have  required  a 
population  of  175,000,000  more  than  our  60,000,000 
now  in  the  land.  Forty  years  ago  Indian  corn  was 
shelled  by  scraping  the  ear  against  the  edge  of  a  fry- 
ing-pan or  shovel,  at  the  rate  of  about  5  bushels  in 
10  hours.  Our  six  great  corn  States  would  be 
obliged  to  have  all  their  people  (2.056,770)  to  sit 
astride  frying-pans  and  shovels  110  days  in  order  to 
shell  their  corn  crop.  In  1790,  before  the  grain  cradle 
was  invented,  a  day  laborer  in  England  could  reap 
with  a  sickle  only  about  one-fourth  of  an  acre  of 
wheat.  Now  a  man  with  two  horses  can  cut,  rake,  and 
bind  in  a  day  twenty  acres.  After  reaping-machines 
had  come  in  the  Western  States,  the  farmers  were 
troubled  to  find  decent  men  to  bind  their  wheat. 
Thereupon  a  machine  was  invented  to  bind  and 
reap  at  the  same  time.  From  all  which  it  appears 
that  labor-saving  machines  have  come  to  stay  for 
the  benefit  of  the  laborer  as  well  as  the  consumer. 
And  the  inventive  genius  of  Americans  has  not  yet 
exhausted  itself  or  lost  its  cunning. 

Nor  in  this  march  of  machinery  does  capital 
escape  a  very  heavy  loss.  If  to-morrow  a  new  labor- 
saving  machine  iii  any  of  our  great  textile  industries 
of  cotton  or  wool  were  invented,  and  saved  even  10  per 
cent  of  the  old  cost,  every  old  machine  would  only 
be  worth  its  weight  as  old  copper  and  iron,  and  capi- 
tal must  either  put  in  the  new 'machine  or  go  out  of 
business.  The  law  of  trade  has  no  mercy  either  on 
man  or  master.  Moreover,  while  labor  could  adapt 
itself  to  some  new  occupation,  capital  would  make 
substantially  a  dead  loss  of  all  its  old  machinery. 


216  NOTES. 

XI.     DO  HIGH  PRICES  MAKE  HIGH  WAGES  ? 

(Page  113.) 

Mr.  Roger  Q.  Mills,  father  of  the  "  Mills  Bill," 
treats  this  question  in  a  very  happy  way,  in  his 
speech  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  April  17, 
1888,  - 

It  is  said  a  high  tariff  makes  high  wages  for  labor.  It  is 
said  if  we  reduce  the  tariff  wages  must  be  reduced.  How  is 
it  high  tariff  makes  high  wa^es  for  labor?  How  can  it  be  ex- 
plained? Why,  they  say,  if  you  increase  the  value  of  the 
domestic  product,  the  manufacturer  is  able  to  pay  higher 
wages.  Unquestionably  he  is,  but  does  he  do  it  ?  No.  Mr. 
Jay  Gould,  with  his  immense  income  from  his  railroad 
property,  is  able  to  pay  his  bootblack  $500  a  day,  but  does  he 
do  it?  Oh,  no;  he  pays  the  market  price  of  the  street.  He 
gets  his  boots  blacked  and  pays  his  nickel,  like  a  little  man. 
Mr.  Vanderbilt,  from  the  income  arising  from  the  interest  on 
the  immense  amount  of  bonds  of  the  Federal  Government  he 
has  got,  can  afford  to  pay  his  hostler  $10,000  a  year.  He  is 
able  to  do  it ;  his  bonds  enable  him  to  do  it ;  but  does  he  do 
it  ?  Oh,  no ;  he  goes  out  into  the  market  and  employs  his 
labor  at  the  market  value,  and  pays  the  same  price  that  the 
humblest  citizen  in  New  York  does. 

High  tariff  does  not  regulate  wages.  Wages  are  regulated 
by  demand  and  supply,  and  the  capacity  of  the  laborer  to  do 
the  work  for  which  he  is  employed.  If  high  tariff  regulated 
wages,  how  is  it  the  wages  in  the  different  States  of  the 
Union  are  different  while  the  tariff  is  all  the  same  from  Maine 
to  California?  In  every  part  of  the  territory  of  the  United 
States  the  tariff  is  the  same.  How  is  it  the  wages  are  not  the 
same  ?  How  is  it  that  wages  in  the  different  localities  in  the 
different  States  are  different?  What  is  the  cause?  What  is 
it  which  disturbs  the  tariff  and  prevents  it  from  fixing  a  high 
rate  of  wages  all  over  the  country  for  labor  ? 

We  find  by  the  census  the  rate  of  wages  in  the  cotton 
industry  is  lower  in  Rhode  Island  than  in  Pennsylvania,  and 
we  find  the  wages  in  the  iron  business  are  higher  in  Rhode 
Island  than  in  Pennsylvania.  Why  is  that  so  ?  It  is  not  the 
tariff  that  does  it.  It  is  the  demand  and  supply  of  the  people 
to  do  the  work  demanded  of  them.  There  are  more  cotton 
operatives  in  Rhode  Island  and  the  supply  is  greater,  and 
therefore  the  wages  are  lower.  The  same  thing  is  true  about 


NOTES. 


247 


the  iron  business  in  Pennsylvania.  The  wages  of  cotton  oper- 
atives in  Pennsylvania  are  higher  because  there  are  fewer  in 
Pennsylvania  than  in  the  State  of  Rhode  Island.  It  is  not  the 
tariff  that  regulates  the  wages.  Well,  what  is  it  that  fixes  the 
high  rate  of  wa^es  in  this  country  ? 

It  is  admitted  by  all  who  are  well  informed  on  this  subject 
that  our  rate  of  wa^es  is  higher  than  anywhere  else  in  the 
world,  that  England  is  higher  than  France,  and  that  the  rate  of 
wages  is  higher  in  France  than  in  Germany.  Why  is  this  ? 
Germany  and  France  both  have  a  protective  tariff  to  guard 
against  the  free-trade  labor  of  England.  What  then  is  it  that 
makes  higher  wages  ?  It  is  coal  and  steam  and  machinery. 
It  is  these  three  powerful  agents  that  multiply  the  product  of 
labor  and  make  it  more  valuable,  and  high  rate  of  wages 
means  low  cost  of  product.  A  high  rate  of  wages  means  that 
cheap  labor  has  got  to  go ;  and  the  history  of  our  country  in 
the  last  fifty  years  demonstrates  that  as  clearly  and  as  con- 
clusively as  any  mathematical  problem  can  be  demonstrated. 

It  is  significant  that  in  Great  Britain  wages  went  up 
between  1872  and  1883,  9  per  cent :  while  they  went 
down  in  Massachusetts  during  the  same  period  5  per 
cent.  —  Mass.  Labor  Report,  1885,  p.  143. 


XII.     STRIKES   AND   LOCKOUTS. 
(Page  US.) 

The  following  table  of  strikes  and  lockouts  dur- 
ing the  "protected''  years,  1881-86,  both  inclusive, 
is  believed  to  be  accurate,  — 


NUMBER. 

sl-s 

w'0 

NUMBER. 

"S^ 

bC  =5  ° 

•S'S 

53   ~'C 

O  fcc> 

c<S  -  ^ 

o^ 

Strikes. 

Estab- 
lish- 

•S IS 

a.5  o 

III 

Lock- 

Estab- 
lish- 

S.2.O 

a^ 

c^ 

11 

ments. 

t«  *"* 

OQ 

outs. 

ments. 

"~^ 

9 

1881 

471 

2,928 

6.2 

129,521 

6 

9 

1.5 

655 

1882 

454 

2,105 

46 

154,606 

21 

42 

2.0 

4.131 

1883 

478 

2,759 

5.8 

149,763 

28 

117 

4.2 

20,512 

1884 

443 

2,367 

5.3 

147,043 

38 

354 

9.3 

18,121 

1885 

645 

2,284 

3.5 

242,705 

52 

183 

35 

15,424 

1886 

1,412 

9,893 

7.0 

500,514 

127 

1,477 

11.6 

100,705 

Total  . 

3,903 

22,336 

5,  7 

1,324,152 

272 

2..182 

8.0 

159,548 

248  NOTES. 


XIII.     HOUSEKEEPING   IN   ENGLAND    AND 
MASSACHUSETTS. 

(Page  115.) 

Comparative  cost  of  living  in  Massachusetts  and 
Great  Britain.  Higher  in  Massachusetts :  rents,  89 
per  cent ;  board  and  lodging,  39  per  cent ;  fuel,  104 
per  cent ;  clothing,  45  per  cent;  dry  goods,  13  per 
cent;  boots  and  shoes,  62^  per  cent;  groceries,  16 
per  cent;  provisions,  23  per  cent.  (Report  of  the 
Massachusetts  Bureau  of  Statistics  for  1884.) 

Between  1860  and  1878,  notwithstanding  the  great 
improvements  made  in  cheapening  the  cost  of  pro- 
duction, the  cost  of  living  in  Massachusetts  increased 
14^  per  cent.1  For  a  family  spending  $500  it  costs 
$68  more  to  live  in  Massachusetts  than  in  England, 
on  precisely  the  same  scale.2 


XIV.     "PAUPER  LABOR  "ON   SHOES. 

(Page  116.) 

The  facts  in  this  connection  are  set  out  by  the 
Hon.  John  E.  Russell,  a  Massachusetts  Representa- 
tive, May  28,  1888,  — 

A  great  deal  has  been  said  about  "pauper  labor"  and 
about  the  workingmen  of  New  England  —  of  Massachusetts, 
for  instance —  being  unable  to  compete  with  it.  I  scorn  that 
argument.  My  people  can  compete  with  the  labor  of  any  part 
of  the  world  if  they  have  a  free  field.  Let  me  give  you  an  in- 
stance in  our  boot  and  shoe  industry  which  will  prove  that.  A 
few  years  ago  one  of  the  great  inventors  of  the  State  of  Mas- 
sachusetts, one  of  the  makers  of  those  magnificent  automatic 
machines  that  play  so  great  a  part  in  the  manufactures  of  our 
day,  invented  and  took  out  letters  patent  all  over  the  world  for 
sewing  and  heeling  machines  which  turned  out  the  handsomest 

*  Mass.  Labor  Rep.  1885,  p.  143. 
2  Ib.,  p.  157. 


NOTES.  249 

boots  and  shoes  that  can  be  made.  The  proprietors  of  those 
machines  did  not  choose  to  sell  them  directly  to  the  manu- 
facturers;  they  preferred  to  lease  them,  their  use  being  paid 
for  by  a  royalty  upon  each  boot  or  shoe  sewed  on  them,  the 
number  being  indicated  by  a  device  which  registered  it  upon 
the  machine  itself. 

After  that  machine  was  started  in  this  country,  they  went 
over  to  Europe  with  it,  and  introduced  it  into  the  great  boot 
and  shoe  manufacturing  establishments  not  only  of  Great 
Britain,  but  also  of  Germany,  and  at  the  end  of  the  year  they 
were  very  much  surprised  to  find  that  their  royalties  from  the 
machines  in  use  in  England  reached  only  47  per  cent  of  what 
they  collected  in  the  State  of  Massachusetts.  They  were 
alarmed  and  suspicious.  They  knew  that  from  the  accurate 
construction  of  the  machine  and  the  certainty  of  its  registering 
power  it  could  not  tell  any  lie  about  its  own  work  ;  so  they  sent 
over  one  of  the  ablest  men  in  Massachusetts  in  the  examination 
of  patent  matters  to  investigate. 

He  came  back  and  told  them  that  they  were  getting  an 
honest  return  from  the  foreign  boot  and  shoe  manufacturers, 
and  that  the  explanation  was  that  the  best  labor  of  England 
could  not  produce  with  those  machines  more  than  47  per  cent 
of  the  amount  of  work  that  was  produced  by  the  Massachusetts 
operatives  upon  the  same  machine.  That  meant  that  the 
American  mechanic,  with  his  enterprise  and  his  ambition, 
standing  at  those  machines,  worked  more  hours  a  day, 
at  a  greater  rate  of  speed,  than  did  the  "  pauper  labor,"  as 
it  is  called,  of  Great  Britain;  it  meant  that  the  Englishman 
quit  work  on  Saturday  afternoon  and  did  not  come  back  to 
work  until  Tuesday  morning ;  it  meant  that  he  would  not  work 
as  many  hours  or  stand  to  his  work  as  well  as  the  Massachu- 
setts workman ;  and  there  is  the  whole  difference  between 
"  pauper  labor  "  and  free  labor. 


XV.     ENGLAND  LIKES  "PROTECTION." 

(Page  118.) 

But,  in  spite  of  these  advantages,  he  reported  to 
his  people  that  the  mill-owners  of  Manchester  need 
not  indulge  in  any  serious  fears  of  competition  from 
this  country.  He  said,  in  concluding  his  observa- 
tion, — 

While,  however,  the  American  nation  heaps  duties  upon  the 
import  of  foreign  machinery,  thus  increasing  the  price  of  mill 


250  NOTES.  m 

construction,  and  in  other  ways  by  her  tariff  arrangements 
artificially  raising  the  cost  of  production,  American  manufac- 
tures will  continue  too  high  in  price  to  compete  with  England 
in  all  but  exceptional  cases. 


XVI.     HIGH    WAGES,   LOW    COST. 

(Page  119.) 

That  the  difficulty  is  not  in  the  labor  cost  of 
American  woollens  is  abundantly  shown  by  the 
facts  set  out  in  the  "  Textile-Workers'  Petition  to 
Congress,"  presented  to  the  House  June  29,  1888, — 

The  relative  productivity  and  earnings  of  the  woollen  and 
worsted  weavers  in  the  United  States  and  England  will  show, 
too,  whether  the  high  standard  of  wages  has  been  kept  up 
here  ;  and,  to  make  the  comparison  perfectly  fair,  we  will  pre- 
sume that  both  weave  the  same  class  of  goods,  80  picks  to  the 
inch: 

Speed  of  loom,  United  States,  average,  85  picks  per  minute. 

Speed  of  loom,  England,  maximum,  60  picks  per  minute. 

Hours  of  labor,  United  States,  60  per  week. 

Hours  of  labor,  England,  54  per  week. 

Product  per  weaver  per  week  of  continuous'  work,  United 
States,  106  yards. 

Product  per  weaver  per  week  of  continuous  work,  England, 
68  yards. 

The  average  loss  of  time  caused  by  breakages,  etc.,  being 
about  one-fifth,  the  net  product  per  week  would  be  in  the  — 

United  States,  85  yards. 
England,  54  yards. 

The  highest  average  rate  of  wages  paid  in  this  country  for 
this  class  of  work  is  2  mills  per  pick  per  yard,  or  16  cents  per 
yard  for  80  pick  work,  and  if  the  same  rate  was  paid  in  Eng- 
land it  would  follow  that  the  American  weaver  can  earn  a  pos- 
sible wage  of  $13.60  cents  per  week  to  the  English  weaver's 
possible  $8.64.  Of  course  the  actual  earnings  are  less  in  both 
cases,  but  the  relative  difference  will  not  vary  either  on  a  rise 
or  fall.  The  earnings,  however,  vary  so  much  throughout  our 
own  country  as  to  bring  the  time  earnings  of  our  weavers  in 
some  cases  even  lower  than  the  time  earnings  of  some  of  the 
European  weavers,  as  will  be  seen  from  the  following  table, 


NOTES.  251 

compiled  from  the  first  annual  report  of  the  National  Com- 
missioner of  Labor,  and  the  same  rule  holds  good  for  every 
other  class  of  workmen  in  the  woollen  industry. 

Daily  wages  of  woollen  weavers  in  the  United  States : 


Delaware  .     .     .     .  $1.71 

Illinois      ....  1.52 

Indiana     ....  1.08 

Massachusetts    .     .  1.28 

Pennsylvania      .     .  1.85 


New  Jersey     .     .     .  $1.00 

New  York       ...  1.08 

North  Carolina    .     .  .75 

Vermont     .     .     .     .  1.17 

Connecticut     .     .     .  1.16 


According  to  the  United  States  consular  reports  the  earnings 
of  woollen  weavers  in  England  vary  from  $3.50  to  $11  per 
week.  If  we  keep  in  view  the  relative  productivity  of  the 
labor  of  this  country  and  England,  we  cannot  avoid  the  con- 
clusion that  the  $4.50  per  week  in  North  Carolina  is  below  the 
lowest  of  England,  and  does  it  not  prove  that  the  American 
manufacturer  gets  his  work  done  cheaper  than  the  English 
manufacturer,  and  that  therefore  the  wages  of  labor  do  not 
and  cannot  find  consideration  in  his  cry  for  more  protection  ? 
It  also  proves  that  we  are  brought  into  daily  competition  with 
labor  in  our  own  country  that  may  be  as  justly  called  "  pauper 
labor  "  as  that  of  Europe.  It  further  proves  that  the  tariff  has 
not  even  preserved  to  us  our  just  share  of  the  natural  oppor- 
tunities of  the  country ;  that  it  has  only  been  instrumental  in 
building  up  colossal  fortunes  for  the  few,  and  that  a  continu- 
ance of  it  will  end  in  our  degradation  to  a  condition  of 
serfdom. 


XVII.     CLEVELAND'S    CHARACTER. 

(Page  136.) 

A  ranch  quoted  opinion  of  Mr.  Cleveland's  char- 
acteristics, by  one  entirely  competent  to  judge,  was 
presented  by  the  Hon.  James  Russell  Lowell,  at  a 
Revenue  Reform  Meeting  in  Boston,  December  29, 
1887.  A  portion  is  appended,  — 

One,  certainly,  of  the  reasons  that  have  brought  us  hither  — 
one,  at  least,  of  those  that  chiefly  suggested  the  opportuneness 
of  our  coming  together  here  —  has  been  the  President's  mes- 
sage at  the  opening  of  the  present  Congress.  Personally,  I 
confess  that  I  feel  myself  strongly  attracted  to  Mr.  Cleveland 
as  the  best  representative  of  the  higher  type  of  Americanism 


252  NOTES. 

that  we  have  seen  since  Lincoln  was  snatched  from  us.  And 
by  Americanism  I  mean  that  which  we  cannot  help,  not  that 
which  we  flaunt —  that  way  of  looking  at  things  and  of  treat- 
ing men  which  we  derive  from  the  soil  that  holds  our  fathers 
and  waits  for  us.  I  think  we  have  all  recognized  in  him  a 
manly  simplicity  of  character  and  an  honest  endeavor  to  do  all 
that  he  could  of  duty,  where  all  that  he  would  was  made 
impossible  by  difficulties,  to  the  hourly  trials  and  temptations 
of  which  we  have  fortunately  never  been  exposed.  But  we  are 
not  here  to  thank  him  as  the  head  of  a  party.  We  are  here  to 
felicitate  each  other  that  the  Presidental  chair  has  a  man  in  it, 
and  this  means  that  every  word  he  says  is  weighted  with  what 
he  is.  We  are  here  to  felicitate  each  other  that  this  man 
understands  politics  to  mean  business,  not  chicanery ;  plain 
speaking,  not  paltering  with  us  in  a  double  sense ;  that  he  has 
had  the  courage  to  tell  the  truth  to  the  country  without  regard 
to  personal  or  party  consequences,  and  thus  to  remind  us  that 
a  country  not  worth  telling  the  truth  to  is  not  worth  living  in  ; 
nay,  deserves  to  have  lies  told  it  and  to  take  the  inevitable  con- 
sequences in  calmly. 

If  it  be  lamentable  that  acts  of  official  courage  should  have 
become  so  rare  among  us  as  to  be  noteworthy,  it  is  consoling 
to  believe  that  they  are  sometimes  contagious.  "So  shines  a 
good  deed  in  a  naughty  world.""  As  courage  is  pre-eminently 
the  virtue  of  men,  so  it  is  the  virtue  which  most  powerfully 
challenges  the  respect  and  emulation  of  men.  We  thank  the 
President  for  having  taught  a  most  pertinent  object  lesson,  and 
from  a  platform  lofty  enough  to  be  seen  of  all  the  people. 
We  should  be  glad  to  think,  though  we  hardly  dare  to  hope, 
that  some  of  the  waiters  on  popular  providence,  whom  we 
humorously  call  statesmen,  would  profit  by  it.  As  one  of  the 
evil  phenomena  which  are  said  to  mark  the  advance  of  Democ- 
racy is  the  decay  of  civic  courage,  we  should  be  grateful  to  the 
President  for  giving  us  reason  to  think  that  this  is  rather  one 
of  its  accidents  than  of  its  properties. 

Whatever  be  the  effect  of  Mr.  Cleveland's  action  on  his  per- 
sonal fortunes,  let  us  rejoice  to  think  that  it  will  be  a  stimulat- 
ing thorn  in  th%t  august  chair  for  all  that  may  sit  in  it  after 
him.  Would  that  all  our  Presidents  might  see  and  lay  to  heart 
that  vision  which  Dion  saw,  that  silent  shape  of  woman,  sweep- 
ing and  ever  sweeping  without  pause.  Our  politics  call  loudly 
for  a  broom.  There  are  rubbish  heaps  of  cant  in  every  corner 
of  them  that  should  be.  swept  out  for  the  dustman.  Time  to 
cart  away  and  dump  beyond  the  sight  or  smell  o.f  mortal 
men.  Mr.  Cleveland,  I  think,  has  found  the  broom  and  begun 
to  ply  it. 

\ 


NOTES. 


253 


XVIII.    PROGRESS    WITH    LOW    TAXES. 

(Page  137.) 

Upon  a  fair  examination  of  statistics  (official)  it 
appears  that  the  rate  of  increase  in  the  commonly 
recognized  evidences  of  prosperity  —  population, 
wealth,  wages,  etc. —  was  greater  under  the  low- 
tariff  period,  1850-1860,  than  under  the  period  of  a 
restrictive  tariff  between  1870  and  1880.  The  tabu- 
lated results  are  given  below.  (Tenth  U.  S.  census, 
Vol.  VII.,  pp.  3,  4,  13) : 


LINES  OP  PROGRESS. 

Increase 
per  centum  under 
low  tariff, 
from  1850  to  I860. 

Average  increase 
per  centum  under 
high  tariff, 
for  eacli  ten  years, 
1860  to  1870, 
and  1870  to  1880. 

35.5 

26  2 

Wealth     

126.6 

61.0 

Foreign  commerce,  aggregate 
Foreign  commerce,  per  capita 
Miles  of  railroad,  aggregate  . 
Miles  of  railroad,  per  capita  . 
Capital  in  manufactures 
Wages  in  manufactures,  aggregate 
Wages  in  manufactures,  per  hand 
Products  of  manufactures  .     .     . 
Value  of  farms      ...... 

131.0 
70.3 
240.0 
150.0 
90.0 
60.3 
17.3 
85.0 
103.0 

45.6 
15.2 

69.0 
34.0 
66.0 
58.2 
9.4 
69.6 
23.6 

Value  of  farm  tools  and  machinery 
Value  of  live  stock  on  farms  .    . 

62.0 
-  100.0 

27.7 
17.3 

In  Massachusetts  alone  the  average  annual  in- 
crease in  Savings  Bank  deposits  from  1850  to  1860 
was  12  per  cent ;  from  1870  to  1880,  5  per  cent. 
(Mass.  Savings  Bank  Rep.,  1887,  p.  616.) 

It  is  hardly  ingenuous  to  ascribe  the  low  tariff  re- 
sults to  the  fact  that  the  Crimean  war,  the  discovery 
of  gold- in  California,  or  the  Irish  famine,  occurred  dur- 
ing the  years  1850-1860,  while  ascribing  the  smaller 
increase  during  the  later  period  to  "protection" 


254  NOTES. 

alone.  If  that  style  of  argument  were  resorted  to, 
the  discovery  of  petroleum,  etc.,  might  go  as  an 
offset.  Everything  considered,  the  fact  of  larger 
increase  under  a  low  tariff  remains  unimpaired. 


XIX.     TEXT   BOOKS. 

(Page  143.) 

In  the  index  to  the  catalogue  of  the  London 
Library  there  is  a  list  of  sevent}^-seven  authors  who 
have  written  on  protection  and  free  trade,  mostly 
English  or  French,  and  several  in  German,  Italian, 
and  Russian.  They  declare,  seventy-five  to  two  (the 
two  being  eccentrics  of  no  note),  that  the  protective 
system  is  a  mistake  most  injurious  to  the  country 
that  adopts  it.1 

A  letter  (1888)  on  the  tariff  from  the  late  pro- 
fessor of  Political  Economy  in  Harvard  College, 
Prof.  Francis  Bowen,  long  known  as  a  protectionist 
of  the  early  school,  arid  addressed  to  a  well-known 
Republican  politician,  expresses  as  well  as  any  the 
attitude  of  students  of  Political  Economy  generally 
towards  our  present  tariff.  After  disclaiming,  in  a 
very  emphatic  way  of  his  own,  that  he  is  a  free- 
trader, as  he  understands  the  phrase,  he  proceeds, 
among  other  things,  to  say  :  "  Our  advantages  for 
producing  any  sort  of  crude  material  adapted  to  our 
soil  and  climate  are  so  immense  that  we  have  here 
no  foreign  competition  to  dread.  To  tax  the  impor- 
tation of  these  is  to  enhance  in  two  respects  the 
price  of  the  articles  into  which  the}^  are  manufac- 
tured :  first,  by  the  additional  cost  of  the  raw  mate- 
rial ;  secondly,  by  the  higher  protective  duty  which 
will  then  be  needed  to  guard  the  home  manufac- 
turer against  his  rivals  abroad.  Thus  the  home  pro- 

1  Free  Trade  and  English  Commerce,  by  Augustus  Mongredieu,  p.  33. 


NOTES.  255 

ducer  of  the  raw  material  will  have  gained  nothing ; 
the  higher  price  which  he  will  have  to  pay  for  all 
manufactured  goods  will  more  than  offset  the  advan- 
tage gained  in  disposing  of  his  own  products. 
Hence  the  almost  unanimous  protest  of  our  woollen 
manufacturers  against  the  duties  on  imported  wools. 
Hence,  also,  the  outcry  against  those  duties  on  all 
articles  used  in  shipbuilding,  which  have  banished 
the  American  flag  from  nearly  all  European  and 
Asiatic  ports.  The  numerous  lines  of  steamers  which 
conduct  the  commerce  of  New  York  and  Boston 
with  Europe,  bear  a  British,  French,  Belgian,  or 
German  flag,  never  an  American  one.  Is  this  your 
mode  of  protecting  American  industry  and  trade  ? 

"  The  monstrous  tariff,  under  the  burden  of 
which  every  portion  of  our  land  is  now  groaning, 
is  still,  with  a  few  trifling  modifications,  the  war 
tariff,  which  was  framed  to  meet  the  exigencies  of 
our  great  civil  contest.  In  its  origin  it  was  not  in- 
tended for  the  protection  of  home  industry,  but  for 
heavy  taxation,  —  to  raise  the  largest  possible  sums 
wherewith  to  support  the  grand  effort  to  defend 
Northern  soil,  and  to  crush  negro  slavery  out  of 
existence.  All  honor  to  the  men  who  framed  it  for 
this  patriotic  purpose.  We  cheerfully  submitted  to 
its  heavy  burden  while  the  war  lasted,  and  for  a  few 
years  after  its  glorious  termination,  till  we  could  see 
our  way  clear  towards  paying  off  the  enormous  debt 
which  was  the  price  of  freedom.  But  to  maintain 
it  during  the  past  ten  years,  to  maintain  it  even  now, 
when  that  debt  is  reduced  to  a  comparatively  insig- 
nificant amount,  and  when  we  have  more  money  in 
the  national  treasury  than  we  know  what  to  do  with, 
is  not  protection,  but  tyranny.  It  is  crushing  our 
native  industries.  It  is  taxing  all  the  necessaries  of 
life,  and  thereby  driving  our  native  workmen  into 
numerous  and  riotous  attempts  to  raise  the  rate  of 
wages  upon  which  they  can  no  longer  subsist.  It 


256  NOTES. 

taxes  the  artisan  and  the  common  laborer  in  the 
necessary  condiments  of  his  daily  food;  in  his  cloth- 
ing, his  tools,  and  his  materials  ;  in  the  blanket  under 
which  he  sleeps  at  night,  and  the  dwelling  that  shel- 
ters him  ;  in  the  fire  that  warms  him,  and  the  light 
by  which  he  works.  Even  God's  sunshine  cannot 
reach  him,  except  through  taxed  glass.  If  he  is 
sick,  he  must  be  medicined  with  taxed  drugs ;  and 
if  he  dies,  to  adopt  Sydney  Smith's  striking  figure, 
he  must  rest  in  a  taxed  coffin,  to  be  taxed  no  more. 

"  And  this  taxation  must  be  kept  up  by  the  whole 
Republican  party,  in  order  to  add  a  further  surplus 
of  about  one  hundred  millions  a  year  to  the  many 
tons  of  gold  and  silver  which  are  already  lying  idle 
in  the  national  treasury.  These  useless  accumula- 
tions are  converted,  through  the  frantic  attempts  of 
Congress  to  diminish  their  amount,  into  a  gigantic 
corruption  fund,  in  order,  by  lavish  local  expendi- 
tures, to  bribe  the  voters  in  certain  favored  districts 
into  supporting  the  iniquitous  system.  If  to  the 
burden  of  this  war  tariff  we  add  the  weight  of  the 
excessive  State  and  municipal  taxation  which  follows 
naturally  in  its  train  and  is  fostered  by  its  example, 
it  will  not  seem  too  much  to  say  that,  while  our  gov- 
ernment is  the  wealthiest  of  all  governments,  our 
people  are  more  heavily  taxed  than  any  other  on  the 
face  of  the  earth.  And  to  increase  the  oddity  of 
the  situation,  it  appeal's  that  with  all  this  superfluity 
of  wealth  at  the  command  of  our  Congress,  we  are 
actually  on  the  verge  of  national  bankruptcy ;  that 
is,  of  being  reduced  through  a  commercial  crisis, 
which  may  occur  at  any  moment,  to  the  use  of  the 
silver  dollar  as  our  only  circulating  medium  ;  that 
is,  again,  to  paying  all  public  and  private  debts  at 
the  rate  of  about  seventy  cents  on  the  dollar.  It 
seems  to  me,  therefore,  that  not  only  our  prosperity 
as  a  people,  but  our  national  character,  is  at  stake. 
We  shall  be  humiliated,  both  in  our  own  esteem  and 


NOTES.  257 

in  the  eyes  of  other  nations,  if  we  remain  sluggishly 
in  this  scandalous  position,  and  continue  to  incur  this 
fearful  risk.  It  is  not  statesmanship,  but  the  mad- 
ness of  party  spirit,  the  greed  of  office-seekers,  and 
the  shouts  of  an  unthinking  mob  incited  by  the  hope 
of  public  plunder,  that  have  placed  us  where  we  are. 
A  vigorous  effort  at  the  impending  election  may 
enable  us  once  more  to  hold  up  our  heads  before  all 
the  world." 

(The  hope  implied  in  the  last  sentence  of  the 
venerable  professor  was  not  realized,  for  Mr.  Cleve- 
land was  not  elected  president.) 


XX.    VICTORIA  AND  NEW  SOUTH  WALES. 

(Page  146.) 

The  Anglo-Australian  colonies  of  Victoria  and 
New  South  Wales  prove  that  even  in  "  young  com- 
munities," the  chosen  field  of  protection,  the  experi- 
ment of  protection  and  free  trade,  when  tried  side 
by  side,  by  equal  countries  under  like  conditions, 
turns  out  in  favor  of  free  trade.  Victoria,  in  1865, 
adopted  protection ;  in  1871  she  adopted  a  very 
intensified  form.  New  South  Wales  has  had  a  tariff 
for  revenue  only.  This  has  been  especially  true 
since  1874.  The  statistics  are  furnished  by  George 
Baden  Powell,  M.A.,  F.R.A.S.,  F.S.S.,  a  well-known 
English  statistician,  who  personally  visited  and  in- 
spected these  colonies  twice  during  the  trade  years 
1870-80,  when  these  statistics  were  made  by  these 
colonies  working  out  their  antagonistic  trade  theo- 
ries. Of  the  nine  English  colonies  who  are  entirely 
free  of  England  to  arrange  their  own  tariffs,  only 
two,  viz.  Canada  and  Victoria,  have  made  "  hostile 
tariffs,"  i.e.  tariffs  of  20  per  cent  average  or  more 
against  imports. 

The   two   colonies,  side   by  side,  with   the  same 


258  NOTES. 

climate,  rich  soil,  mineral  and  agricultural  wealth, 
the  like  English  population  in  both,  with  railroads, 
ample  capital,  and  all  the  other  adjuncts  of  civiliza- 
tion to  assist,  started  out  on  their  trade  careers  at 
about  the  same  time,  1871.  Both  had  ample  terri- 
tories;—  Victoria  having  55,000,000  acres;  New 
South  Wales,  198,000,000.  Victoria  had  a  popula- 
tion of  730,000  (or  170,000  less  than  the  State  of 
New  Jersey),  New  South  Wales  had  520,000  (or 
about  the  population  of  Connecticut).  Three-fourths 
of  the  area  of  both  colonies  were  still  unsettled,  and 
while  Victoria  had  about  ten  persons  to  a  square 
mile,  New  South  Wales  had  three,  thus  giving 
Victoria  whatever  advantage  there  is  in  a  denser 
population.  Coal  is  found  only  in  New  South 
Wales,  and  is  brought  to  Sydney,  its  manufacturing 
centre,  by  water,  in  a  day,  while  it  takes  three  days 
to  carry  it  to  Melbourne,  the  manufacturing  centre  of 
Victoria.  To  offset  this  advantage  in  transportation, 
which,  it  will  be  seen,  is  not  great,  Victoria  had  a 
great  superiority  in  the  production  of  gold ;  though 
in  both  colonies,  from  natural  causes  not  necessary 
to  mention  here,  gold-mining  declined  (1870-80). 
Victoria  had  more  men  and  more  capital. 

At  the  end  of  ten  years,  statistics,  mainly  derived 
from  the  official  documents  and  records  of  the 
Victoria  government  itself,  show  the  following  re- 
sults. It  might  be  thought  that  in  manufactures,  at 
least,  the  protection  country,  Victoria,  would  lead. 
The  plea  that  protection  makes  is,  that  it  fosters 
manufactures  and  gives  employment  to  more  people 
who  would  else  go  without  work.  But  what  hap- 
pened in  Australia?  At  the  end  of  this  period  of 
ten  years,  3.7  per  cent  of  the  population  of  New 
South  Wales  were  engaged  in  manufactures;  3.2  per 
cent  in  Victoria ;  though  in  Victoria  some  20,000 
gold-miners,  mostly  skilled  mechanics,  through  failure 
of  the  mines,  had  been  set  free  to  assist  the  Victoria 


NOTES.  259 

manufacturers.  The  statistics  also  show  that  the 
manufactures  became  as  diversified  in  free  trade 
New  South  Wales  as  in  Victoria,  thus  settling  the 
fallacy  that  a  high  tariff,  rather  than  free  trade, 
creates  diversity  of  manufactures.  In  1880,  Victoria 
employed  750  hands  in  woollens ;  New  South  Wales 
300.  But  in  1870,  Victoria  built  800  tons  of  ship- 
ping, and  New  South  Wales  1800  tons.  In  1880 
Victoria's  output  of  ships  had  fallen  to  400  tons,  and 
New  South  Wales  had  risen  to  3000  tons. 

The  Victoria  "protected"  manufacturers  mean- 
while had  not  been  slow  to  see  and  complain  of  the 
advantages  which  their  free-trade  competitors  of 
New  South  Wales  had  over  them  in  free  raw  mate- 
rial. As  late  as  1880  the  Victoria  bootmakers, 
through  their  committee,  declared  that  they  found  it 
difficult  to  sell  outside  their  home  market  because  of 
the  competition  from  New  South  Wales,  and  they 
give  this  reason,  "  All  leathers  —  the  boot-manufac- 
turers' raw  material  —  are  admitted  free  into  the 
port  of  Sydney  (New  South  Wales),  while  an  import 
duty  of  7-J-,  10,  and  20  per  cent  is  enforced  in  Victo- 
ria, thereby  placing  the  New  South  Wales  manufac- 
turers at  an  advantage." 

Again  :  as  these  two  colonies  contain  a  very  in- 
dustrious and  able  British  population  and  as  they 
are  young,  they  import  according  to  their  population 
more  largely  than  either  the  United  States  or  Great 
Britain.  For  while  the  United  States  import  about 
$10  for  each  inhabitant  and  Great  Britain  $50,  these 
Australian  colonies  annually  import  $100  worth  of 
goods  for  each  man,  woman,  and  child.  Protection, 
therefore,  does  not  keep  out  foreign  goods  from 
Victoria  any  more  than  from  her  rival,  only  New 
South  Wales,  getting  her  imports  at  much  less  cost, 
enjoys  them  at  home,  turns  round  with  her  wares 
made  cheaper  by  her  low  tariff  and  drives  out 
Victoria  from  the  markets  abroad. 


260  NOTES. 

The  figures  are  equally  significant  in  the  matter 
of  revenue.  Protection  insists  that  its  duties  are 
necessary  in  order  to  raise  revenue,  and  that  the 
higher  the  tariff  the  greater  the  revenue.  But  from 
1870  the  Victoria  revenue,  with  man}^  fluctuations, 
chiefly  downward,  yielded  in  1880  about  17,000,000 
annually.  In  the  same  period  the  customs  revenue 
of  New  South  Wales  steadily  rose  from  $4,750,000 
to  $6,500,000.  In  other  words,  New  South  Wales, 
with  less  population  and  a  low  tariff,  contributed 
about  as  much  revenue  as  Victoria  with  a  larger 
population  and  a  protective  tariff. 

The  same  thing  seems  true  as  to  general  pros- 
perity and  growth.  In  1870  New  South  Wales  was 
doing  an  external  trade  of  $95,00(1,000  yearly.  In 
1880  this  trade  had  risen  to  $147,500,000.  In  1870 
the  same  trade  of  Victoria  stood  at  $138,000,000. 
In  1880  it  stood  at  $152,500,000.  The  free-trade 
colony  was  doing  $50,000,000  more  business  than  at 
the  start ;  the  "protected  "  colony  $15,000,000  more  ; 
or,  in  other  words,  under  a  low  tariff  this  trade  had 
increased  by  more  than  one-half,  under  a  high  tariff 
one-ninth. 

To  look  a  little  closer:  in  1870  the  value  of  the 
produce  or  manufacture  of  each  colony  was  exactly 
77  per  cent  of  the  total  value  exported  from  each 
colony.  In  1880  the  amount  of  this  native  produce 
had  risen  to  83  per  cent  in  New  South  Wales  and 
fallen  to  68  per  cent  in  Victoria ;  or,  in  other  words, 
under  free  trade  exports  had  increased ;  under  a 
high  tariff,  fallen.  As  to  imports :  in  1870  New 
South  Wales  imported  $45,000,000.  In  1880, 
$70,000,000  —  a  60  per  cent  increase.  In  1870 
Victoria  imported  $62,500,000.  In  1880,  $73,000,000 
—  an  increase  of  20  per  cent;  "in  other  words,"  to 
use  Mr.  Powell's  sentence,  "  not  only  the  power 
but  the  using  of  the  power  to  purchase  foreign 
produce  (and  there  was  profit  accruing  to  each  pur- 


NOTES.  261 

chase  made)  increased  by  about  three  times  the 
speed  under  the  low  tariff  to  what  it  did  under  the 
high  tariff." 

Now,  then,  as  to  the  condition  of  the  population 
of  these  two  colonies.  In  the  ten  years  under 
review  the  population  of  New  South  Wales  increased 
from  520,000  to  740,000,  48  per  cent.  Victoria  in- 
creased from  730,000  to  860,000,  17  per  cent.  A 
blunder  in  the  census,  detected  by  the  Victoria 
Statistical  Department  in  1880,  reveals  a  still  more 
curious  fact  in  the  relations  of  the  two  colonies. 
Victoria's  population  of  860,000  was  76,000  over  the 
mark,  representing  in  large  measure  the  people  who 
had  deserted  her  " protection"  for  the  free  trade  of 
New  South  Wales.  Indeed,  the  fact  of  this  emigra- 
tion is  now  well  known  in  both  colonies  and  is  often 
complained  of  in  Victoria.  Prices  of  the  necessaries 
of  life  are  lower  of  course  in  the  free-trade  colony, 
though  the  value  of  ratable  property  has  doubled 
in  ten  years  in  New  South  Wales,  and  only  increased 
by  one-half  in  Victoria. 

In  New  South  Wales  the  tonnage  of  shipping 
visiting  the  colony  increased  from  1,500,000  to 
2,600,000  tons.  In  Victoria,  from  1,300,000  to 
2,200,000.  These  figures  are  more  significant  when 
the  records  of  ballast  are  considered.  In  the  decade, 
3,000,000  tons  of  shipping  in  ballast  visited  New 
South  Wales  ;  117,000  tons  left  her  in  ballast.  There 
came  to  Victoria  in  the  same  period,  113,000  tons  of 
shipping  in  ballast ;  2,500,000  tons  left  her  in  ballast, 
the  greater  part  of  which  went  to  New  South. Wales. 
Empty  ships  arriving  in  New  South  Wales,  in  1870, 
were  220,000  tons;  in  1880,320,000  tons.  Empty 
ships  leaving  Victoria,  in  1870, 198,000  tons ;  in  1880, 
250,000  tons. 

The  savings-bank  deposits  are  a  fair  index  of 
prosperity,  a  general  increase  of  wealth  showing 
itself  in  a  great  increase  of  these  deposits.  In  New 


262  NOTES. 

South  Wales  the  deposits  had  increased  from 
$4,650,000  to  $7,500,000,  and  the  number  of  de- 
positors from  21,000  to  32,000.  In  Victoria  the 
deposits  had  increased  from  $5,500,000  to  $8,000,000; 
but  the  depositors  had  increased  in  number  from 
38,000  to  76,000.  In  other  words,  the  average 
amount  deposited  in  New  South  Wales  has  risen 
steadily  from  $220  per  head  to  $235  per  head.  In 
Victoria  the  average  deposited  per  head  had  fallen 
from  $145  per  head  to  $75  per  head.  In  other 
words,  the  wealth  was  accumulating  in  the  hands  of  a 
few.  It  has  followed  that  the  average  wages  of 
skilled  labor  grew  in  New  South  Wales  from  being 
lower  to  being  higher  than  similar  wages  in  Victoria. 
In  other  words,  wages  rose  higher  under  a  low  tariff 
than  under  a  high  tariff.  As  stated,  the  wages  were 
not  only  higher,  but  their  purchasing  power  was 
largely  increased. 

Marriages  also  are  a  sign  of  prosperity  as  well 
as  a  cause.  In  New  South  Wales  the  annual  num- 
ber of  marriages  steadily  increased  from  3,800  to 
5,100,  an  increase  of  one-third.  In  Victoria,  the 
increase  in  annual  number  has  been  from  4,700  to 
5,100,  an  increase  of  one-eighth.  Compared  to  popu- 
lation, marriages  in  New  South  Wales  are  as  7  to 
1,000  of  population  ;  in  Victoria,  they  are  but  6  to 
1,000.  This  is  emphasized  by  the  fact  that  there  are 
more  women  in  proportion  in  the  colony  where  the 
marriages  are  the  less  common.  In  New  South 
Wales  there  being  80  women  to  100  men ;  whereas, 
in  Victoria  there  are  90  women  to  every  100  men. 
Perhaps  the  draft  of  men  from  the  "protected"  to 
the  free-trade  country  may  assist  in  explaining  this 
phenomenon. 

The  feeling  of  the  industrial  classes  differs 
greatly  in  the  two  colonies.  General,  outspoken 
discontent  among  capitalists  and  working-men  is 
visible  in  Victoria ;  it  is  a  salient  feature  lacking 


NOTES.  263 

in  New  South  Wales.  Each  industrial  class  in  Vic- 
toria has  in  turn  complained  of  the  duties  which 
especially  weigh  on  it.  Miners  demand  lower  duties 
on  mining  machinery  and  tools.  Farmers  threaten 
to  give  up  farming  because  of  the  high  prices  they 
are  forced  to  pay  for  their  implements  and  materials. 
Multitudes  of  laborers,  the  very  men  who  insisted, 
by  their  votes,  in  placing  these  burdens,  have  had, 
from  time  to  time,  to  stave  off  starvation  at  relief- 
work  wages.  It  was  with  general  approbation  that 
a  recent  premier  of  Victoria  promised  the  country 
"  a  free  breakfast-table." 


XXI.     ENGLISH   OPINION. 

(Page  153.) 

The  general  English  opinion  of  our  commercial 
future,  under  a  reformed  tariff,  is  that  outlined  by 
Mr.  Gladstone  at  Leeds.  Lord  Brassey,  one  of 
the  largest  English  manufacturers,  says  in  his 
"  Lectures  on  the  Labor  Question,"  "  If  the  duties 
imposed  in  the  United  States  on  all  raw  materials 
should  be  repealed,  and  if,  as  we  may  reasonably 
anticipate,  the  cost  of  living  should  be  materially 
lessened,  the  cost  of  production  under  those  more 
favorable  circumstances  would  be  so  much  reduced 
that  the  present  advantages  of  the  British  manufac- 
turer would  cease,  and  there  would  be  no  longer  a 
sufficient  margin  to  cover  the  cost  of  transportation 
from  this  country  to  America."  (And  if  the  Ameri- 
can mechanic  could  outmatch  his  English  brother  in 
producing  goods  at  a  lesser  cost,  as  his  record  shows 
he  can,  there  would  then  be  a  sufficient  margin  to 
cover  the  cost  of  transporting  those  goods  into 
England,  and  to  sell  them  in  competition  with  the 
English  manufacturer,  and  at  a  profit.) 

In  1882,   William   Rathborne,   M.P.,  said  in    his 


264  NOTES. 

essay  on  "Protection  and  Communism":  "There  is 
a  great  and  growing  feeling  in  this  country  that  it  is 
in  the  interest  of  England  that  the  United  States 
should  still  adhere  to  protection.  As  long  as  they 
do  so,  it  is  thought  England  is  safe  from  her  only 
dangerous  competitor  in  the  markets  of  the  world." 

Mr.  Joseph  Chamberlain,  M.P.,  said  in  1882,  to 
an  English  audience:  "For  myself,  speaking  only  as 
an  Englishman,  I  look  forward  with  anxiety,  not 
un mingled  with  alarm,  to  .the  time  when  our  mer- 
chants and  manufacturers  will  have  to  face  the  free 
and  unrestricted  competition  of  the  great  republic 
of  the  west,  and  when  the  enterprise  of  its  citizens 
and  the  unparalleled  resources  of  its  soil  will  no 
longer  be  shackled  and  handicapped  by  the  artificial 
restrictions  which  have  hitherto  impeded  the  full 
development  of  its  external  commerce."  (It  may  be 
stated  on  good  authority  that  Mr.  Chamberlain  is 
interested  in  the  maintenance  of  the  American  tariff 
on  wood  screws,  in  the  manufacture  of  which  he  is 
engaged,  and  that  he  has  received  large  subsidies 
from  his  American  competitors,  for  agreeing  not  to 
throw  his  goods  on  the  American  market.  Ques- 
tion: Do  or  do  not  the  American  consumers  of  wood 
screws  pay  these  subsidies?) 

Sir  Charles  Dilke,  one  of  the  ablest  men  in  Eng- 
land, is  reported  as  saying  in  1888 :  "  One  of  the 
chief  elements  of  our  present  commercial  and  ship- 
ping predominance  has  always  seemed  to  me  to  be 
that  our  great  natural  rival  of  the  New  World 
prefers  to  feed  on  her  own  fat,  like  the  hibernating 
bear,  and  leaves  us  free  outside  to  range  the  globe." 


NOTES.  265 

XXII.     LUMBER. 

(Page  192.) 

Certain  interesting  facts  with  regard  to  lumber 
appear  in  a  speech  of  W.  D.  Bynum,  a  representa- 
tive from  Indiana,  on  June  5,  1888,  during  the  tariff 
debate  of  that  year,  — 

Much  has  been  said  about  the  wages  paid  by  the  lumber 
manufacturers  of  Michigan  and  other  States.  It  is  claimed 
that  if  lumber  is  placed  upon  the  free  list  wages  in  this  industry 
will  be  reduced.  Jt  will  require  more  than  mere  assertions  ;  it 
will  require  more  than  the  testimony  of  interested  parties  to 
convince  me  that  wages  are  higher  in  the  lumber  regions  of 
Michigan  than  they  are  in  close  proximity  in  Canada.  Such  a 
statement  the  gentleman  from  Maine  (Mr.  Reed)  would  say 
"everybody  knows  is  absurd."  The  laborers  of  Canada  are 
not  going  to  work  for  30  per  cent  less  if  by  crossing  an  imagi- 
nary line  they  can  get  30  per  cent  more  wages.  They  will 
come  over  and  keep  coming  until  wages  have  so  fallen  in  the 
United  States  and  so  risen  in  Canada  as  to  be  upon  an  equality. 
What  has  the  tariff  done  ?  That  it  has  put  one  penny  into  the 
pockets  of  the  wage- workers  no  one  has  dared  to  claim.  Every 
member  upon  the  other  side,  when  pressed,  has  admitted  that 
the  wages  paid  by  the  lumbermen  are  no  greater  than  those 
paid  in  other  avocations  in  the  same  locality.  Who,  then,  has 
received  any  benefit  ? 

The  price  of  white-pine  lumber  has  advanced  several  dollars 
per  thousand  in  the  last  two  years.  The  price  in  Saginaw, 
Mich.,  in  1876  was  $9.67  per  thousand;  in  1877  it  was  $9.73; 
in  1878  it  was  $9.66  ;  in  1879  it  was  $9.50  ;  in  1880  the  stump- 
age,  that  is,  the  timber  had  been  so  reduced  that  the  same  had 
come  under  the  control  of  a  few  men,  who,  organizing  a  com- 
bination, advanced  the  price  to  $11.63.  In  1881  it  was  further 
advanced  to  $13.92,  and  in  1882  it  was  sold  as  high  as  $14  per 
thousand,  and  still  sells  for  about  that  price ;  that  is,  good 
common  white  pine  lumber.  This  advance  was  brought  about 
by  a  combination  of  the  owners  of  the  stumpage,  who  were 
principally  the  lumbermen.  The  lumber  barons  have  gotten 
hold  of  all  the  timber,  advanced  the  price  of  stumpage  from  an 
average  of  $1  to  an  average  of  $4.50  per  thousand.  This  was 
the  cause  of  the  advance  in  the  price  of  timber  lands  of  from 
300  to  1,000  per  cent,  as  stated  by  the  gentleman  from  Minne- 
sota (Mr.  Wilson).  The  gentleman  from  Maine  (Mr.  Reed) 
attempted  to  answer  this  in  his  usual  style,  declaring  that  the 


266  NOTES. 

increase  in  value  was  solely  on  account  of  the  wonderful 
growth  and  progress  that  had  taken  place  throughout  the 
country.  The  truth  is  that  the  best  farming  lands  in  Ohio, 
Indiana,  and  the  Western  States,  which  have  been  improved, 
have  during  this  period  fallen  instead  of  risen  in  value. 

This  argument  is  upon  a  par  with  all  the  sophistry  that  has 
been  made  use  of  by  gentlemen  upon  the  other  side  during 
this  debate.  Why  should  white-pine  stumpage  have  advanced 
so  marvellously,  while  the  stumpage  of  all  other  kinds  of 
timber  remained  stationary  ?  Why  should  this  class  of  stump- 
age  be  worth  $4.50  per  thousand  in  the  United  States  and  only 
$1.25  per  thousand  in  Canada?  The  reason  is  perfectly  ap- 
parent :  a  few  men  own  the  timber  in  the  United  States,  they 
have  combined  to  realize  every  dollar  they  possibly  can  out  of  it. 
They  have  an  advantage  over  their  Canadian  competitor  of  about 
$1  per  thousand  in  the  cost  of  transportation,  and  $2  per  thou- 
sand in  the  duty,  and  these  they  have  added  to  the  value  of  their 
timber  and  estimate  it  as  a  part  of  the  cost  of  lumber.  Every 
dollar  goes  to  the  owners  of  the  stumpage.  Let  us  see  what 
their  profits  amount  to.  The  government  sold  the  lands  upon 
which  the  timber  stands  at  from  $1.25  to  $2.50  per  acre — a 
section  at  the  highest  price  costing  $1,600.  These  lands,  accord- 
ing to  the  lowest  estimate,  contain,  upon  an  average,  a  stump- 
age  of  5,000  feet  per  acre.  A  section,  therefore,  contains  a 
stumpage  of  3,200,000,  which,  at  $4.50  per  thousand,  brings 
$14,400. 

The  land,  after  the  timber  has  been  removed,  sells  for  from 
$2.50  to  $10  per  acre.  Upon  an  average  it  brings  more  than 
the  original  cost.  The  lumbermen,  therefore,  realize  a  clean 
profit  off  of  each  section  of  land  purchased  by  them  of  over 
$15,000. 

Here  is  where  the  $2  per  thousand  duty  has  gone.  Here  is 
where  your  protection  protects.  It  has  not  gone  into  the 
calloused  hand  of  the  wage-worker,  but  into  the  price  of 
the  timber,  before  labor  has  touched  it,  and  afterwards  into 
the  bank  accounts  of  the  timber  or  lumber  barons.  Shall 
we  uphold  and  sustain  this  monopoly,  or  shall  we  release 
the  people  from  its  grasp  ? 


NOTES.  267 

XXIII.     WHO    GETS   TARIFF   PROFITS? 

(Page  193.) 

Mr.  Mills,  in  his  tariff  speech  of  April  2,  1888,  in 
the  House  of  Representatives,  has  certain  interesting 
instances  of  the  stoppage  in  transitu  of  profits  nomi- 
nally intended  for  the  enrichment  of  labor,  — 

The  tariff  is  not  intended  to  and  does  not  benefit  labor. 
The  benefit  of  the  tariff  never  passes  beyond  the  pocket  of  the 
manufacturer,  and  to  the  pockets  of  his  workmen. 

I  find  in  this  report  one  pair  of  five-pound  blankets.  The 
whole  cost,  as  stated  by  the  manufacturer,  is  $2.51.  The 
labor  cost  he  paid  for  making  them  is  35  cents.  The  present 
tariff  is  $1.90.  Now,  here  is  $1.55  in  this  tariff  over  and 
above  the  entire  labor  cost  of  these  blankets.  Why  did  not 
that  manufacturer  go  and  give  that  money  to  the  laborer  ?  He 
is  able  to  do  it.  Here  is  a  tariff  that  gives  him  $1.90  on  that 
pair  of  blankets  for  the  benefit  of  his  laborer,  but,  notwith- 
standing that  the  tariff  was  imposed  for  the  benefit  of  American 
labor  and  to  preserve  high  wages,  every  dollar  of  that  tariff 
went  into  the  manufacturer's  pocket.  The  poor  fellow  who 
made  the  blankets  got  35  cents,  and  the  manufacturer  kept 
the  $1.90. 

Mr.  Grain. —  Will  the  gentleman  please  state  how  much  the 
committee  has  reduced  that  duty  ? 

Mi\  Mills.—  To  $1.00  from  $1.90. 

Take  another  pair  of  5-pound  blankets.  The  total  cost  is 
$2.70.  The  labor  cost  is  70  cents.  The  tariff  is  $1.98.  Now, 
how  strange  it  is  that  none  of  these  sums  that  were  intended 
for  the  laborer  ever  get  beyond  the  pocket  of  the  manufacturer. 
Why  is  it,  when  the  American  Congress  enacted  this  legisla- 
tion for  the  benefit  of  our  labor,  that  every  dollar  of  this  aid 
intended  for  labor  stops  in  the  pockets  of  the  manufacturer, 
who  goes  into  the  highways  and  hedges  and  hires  his  laborer 
at  the  lowest  price  for  which  he  can  get  him  in  the  market, 
and  then  pockets  the  tariff  benefits  that  we  are  told  every  day 
is  intended  for  the  laborer  alone  —  for  the  benefit  of  labor. 

Here  is  another  pair  of  5-pound  blankets.  The  cost  is 
$3.39.  The  labor  cost  paid  by  this  manufacturer,  he  says 
himself,  is  61  cents.  The  tariff  is  $2.55.  In  the  pending  bill 
we  have  left  him  $1.35,  and  we  have  left  the  other  man  $1.08. 
And  we  have  left  all  alon^  not  only  enough  to  cover  the  dif- 
ference, if  there  was  any  difference,  between  the  labor  cost  of 
production  in  Europe  and  the  labor  cost  of  production  in  this 
country,  but  we  have  left  enough  to  pay  for  all  the  labor  and 
a  bonus  besides. 


268  NOTES. 

Let  us  go  on  a  little  further.  Here  is  1  yard  of  flannel, 
weighing  4  ounces ;  it  cost  18  cents,  of  which  the  laborer  got 
3  cents ;  the  tariff  on  it  is  eight  cents.  How  is  it  that  the 
whole  eight  cents  did  not  get  into  the  pockets  of  the  laborer  ? 
Is  it  not  strange  that  those  who  made  the  tariff  and  fastened 
upon  the  people  these  war  rates  in  a  time  of  profound  peace, 
and  who  are  now  constantly  assailing  the  Democratic  party 
because  it  is  untrue  to  the  workingman,  did  not  make  some 
provision  by  which  the  generous  bounty  they  gave  should 
reach  the  pocket  of  him  for  whom  they  said  it  was  intended  ? 
They  charge  that  we  are  trying  to  strike  down  the  labor  of  the 
country.  Why  do  they  not  see  that  the  money  they  are  taking 
out  of  the  hard  earnings  of  the  peeple  is  delivered  in  good 
faith  to  the  workman  ? 

One  yard  of  cassimere  weighing  16  ounces  costs  $1.38; 
the  labor  cost  is  29  cents ;  the  tariff  duty  is  80  cents/  One 
pound  of  sewing  silk  costs  $5.66 ;  the  cost  for  labor  is  85 
cents;  the  tariff  is  $1.69.  One  gallon  of  linseed  oil  costs  46 
cents  ;  the  labor  cost  is  two  cents ;  the  tariff  cost  is  twenty-five 
cents.  One  ton  of  bar-iron  costs  $31 ;  the  labor  cost  is  $10; 
the  tariff  fixes  several  rates  for  bar-iron.  I  give  the  lowest 
rate,  $17.92.  One  ton  of  foundry  pig-iron  costs  $11;  the 
labor  costs  $1.64  ;  the  tariff  is  $6.72. 

Let  us  take  Bessemer  steel  rails.  We  are  told  that  the 
steel-rail  industry  is  in  great  danger  of  utterly  perishing  away 
and  departing  from  this  continent,  because  we  propose  to 
reduce  the  duty  from  $17  to  $11. 

The  whole  cost  is  put  down  at  $31,  the  labor  cost  at  $7.57  ; 
the  tariff  is  $17.  The  manufacturer  has  $9.43  more  for  each 
ton  than  all  the  labor  cost.  The  labor  cost  of  this  ton  is  excep- 
tionally high.  I  have  a  statement  of  the  labor  cost  of  a 
ton  of  steel  rails  at  Bethlehem,  Pa.,  taken  recently  by  Mr. 
Schoenof,  and  it  shows  labor  cost  there  $3.85  per  ton.  The 
labor  cost  of  a  ton  of  steel  rails  in  England  is  not  one  dollar 
cheaper  than  here.  Mr.  Schoenof  informs  me  that  a  ton  of  bar- 
iron  costs,  for  labor,  in  England  about  $7.75,  and  here  about 
$8.  But  let  us  leave  these  and  proceed  with  the  official 
figures.  A  keg  of  steel  nails  costs  $2.34 ;  the  labor  cost  is  67 
cents,  the  tariff  is  $1.25.  A  ton  of  pipe-iron  costs  $34.57; 
labor  cost,  $12.26,  the  tariff  is  $22.40. 

Here  is  a  car-wheel  weighing  500  pounds  ;  cost  $13  ;  labor 
cost  85  cents :  tariff  rate  is  2i  cents  per  pound,  equivalent  to 
$12.50,  to  cover  a  labor  cost  of  85  cents !  Why,  Mr.  Chair- 
man, these  laborers  of  ours  ought  to  get  immensely  rich  if  they 
could  get  all  that  Congress  votes  to  them,  if  the  manufac- 
turers did  not  stop  the  bounties  intended  by  the  government  to 
reach  the  pockets  of  the  workingmen. 


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